


The Seduction of John S. Willoughby

by tepidspongebath



Series: Seduction [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: ACD retelling, Case Fic, Humor, M/M, Pre-Slash, Seduction, The Adventure of Charles Augustus Milverton
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-09
Updated: 2012-12-11
Packaged: 2017-11-14 00:38:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 28
Words: 39,570
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/509470
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tepidspongebath/pseuds/tepidspongebath
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>To stop a blackmailer, Sherlock Holmes decides to enter unfamiliar territory. But not before practicing on John Watson. A retelling of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's <i>The Adventure of Charles Augustus Milverton</i>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Making the long, hard transfer of this fic from where it was originally posted on fanfiction.net. Er. This was my first ever Sherlock fic, and, in my head, it's set somewhere between _The Blind Banker_ and _The Great Game_.
> 
> A **Chinese translation of this fic by yutrans54** can be found on fan forums [here](http://www.mtslash.com/viewthread.php?tid=72342&extra=page%3D2%26amp%3Bfilter%3Dtype%26amp%3Btypeid%3D13) and [here](http://221dnet.211.30i.cn/bbs/forum.php?mod=viewthread&tid=2860&extra=page%3D1).
> 
> A [**Czech translation**](https://www.fanfiction.net/s/10570773/1/Sveden%C3%AD-Johna-S-Willoughbyho) by [Heredhether](https://www.fanfiction.net/u/3829883/Heredhether) can also be found on FanFiction.net. 
> 
> I am so grateful for both of these.

There was milk in the fridge.

No, wait.

John Watson revised the statement in his head.  _For once_ , there was  _a full bottle of_  milk in the fridge,  _and he hadn't put it there._  And the milk had company. There was also marmalade, a bar of chocolate and some eggs, and various other edibles. Actual, edible food in the kitchen of 221B Baker Street, put there in all probability by Sherlock Holmes himself. It was nothing short of a miracle. John felt that the heavens should open up, complete with a chorus of singing angels. True, there was still a severed foot on the bottom shelf, but you couldn't have everything.

"Sherlock," he called, passing into the sitting room, "you did the shopping?"

The world's only consulting detective was stretched full-length on the sofa, and was not appreciably doing anything. In fact, from the way one hand was trailing limply on the floor, and the way his eyes were unfocused, he could have been mistaken for a corpse. John was briefly tempted to poke him to see if this was indeed the case.

The fingers of the hand on the floor twitched ever so slightly. "Brilliant deduction, John," he said, his voice slack, his lips barely moving.

"At least you're being productive," muttered John under his breath. "Thanks," he said a little louder.

"I figured it was my turn. And I needed drain cleaner. Molly won't let me have any more sodium hydroxide. Said the lab's on a tight budget, but I suspect she's just being petulant. Maybe I shouldn't have mentioned her shoes."

John sank down onto one of the armchairs in front of the fireplace. "And so you suddenly felt domestic? Or are you just not working on anything?" As he turned to look at his flatmate, something on the table caught his eye. "Sherlock," he said sternly, "is that my mug?"

"Hm, what, of course it is. I made you tea. It should still be acceptably warm, even if you did take that unexpected detour to the bookshop. There were biscuits, too, but I got bored."

John opened his mouth to ask  _how_  Sherlock had known about his popping in to look at a book on writing creative nonfiction, but decided it wasn't something he needed to know. It was just one of those things – like random body parts from dead people – that came with the territory of sharing a flat with Sherlock Holmes. He tried again. "Biscuits?"

"They'd still be here if you hadn't paused to read…what was it, the table of contents, or the chapter headings?" He blinked. "Yes, chapter headings, you flicked through the book instead of just looking at one page. They were the buttery kind you like so much."

"Who are you and what have you done with Sherlock Holmes?"

"Eh?"

"I can get you buying the groceries, but, really, tea? And  _biscuits_?"

"You don't like it?"

"Well, I – um – appreciate it, Sherlock. Just. Coming from you – it's a little…weird."

"But if it wasn't me, would it be 'weird?' No, never mind, don't answer that. If you don't want the tea, I'll take it." Sherlock sat up, suddenly bright and alert. "And, as a matter of fact, I  _am_ working on something. You might be interested since you like blogging so much. Do you know Charles A. Milverton?"

"The gossip columnist? The one with that vicious blog?"

"Him, yes."

"Has he gotten himself killed or something?"

" _What_? No, nothing like that. Contrary to popular belief, people don't have to  _die_  to get me interested. You lot can only think up so many ways to do each other in for only so many reasons, and it is staggering how very little imagination people can have when it comes to the everyday murder. No, no, Charles Milverton is very much alive, and that actually poses something of a problem to" – he tossed John a newspaper from the coffee table, folded to prominently display the photograph of a young, smiling, very well-dressed woman – "Lady Brackenwell, formerly Mary Fraser, married happily to Sir Edward for three years now. Milverton is trying to blackmail her with some very inappropriate pictures, taken last month, of her with a young man who is not her husband. Says he'll post them on his blog and have them printed in every London tabloid unless paid five million pounds by next Saturday."

"I thought you didn't care who was sleeping with whom."

"I don't. But Milverton  _challenged_ me."

"He did  _what_?"

"Lady Brackenwell contacted me over the website. I told her to tell her husband, maybe some of her friends, come clean, apologize, then to tell Milverton to piss off because he had no hold over her anymore, which was what any sensible person should do, and to  _leave me alone_. She followed my advice – though I doubt she was completely honest – and apparently told Milverton that she had me on the case. Milverton emailed back to say that the public wouldn't be as open to her  _indiscretion_  as her loved ones, and that  _I_  couldn't do a damn thing about it because he was too  _smart_  for me." Sherlock practically snarled the last sentence.

John had started on the tea, and it was actually good. Very good. And he almost choked on it at what Sherlock said. He wouldn't be surprised if Charles Milverton didn't stay alive for very much longer.

"He said that, did he?" he said shakily. "And you're going to…"

"Crush him."

"Wonderful plan, Sherlock."

"Don't be sarcastic, John, it doesn't suit you. Apparently Milverton got the pictures from an enterprising paparazzo, there is only one copy of the files – so that no-one  _else_  can blackmail Lady Brackenwell apparently – and he keeps this in an external hard drive kept under lock and key in his house. I'm going to find it and destroy it."

"And it's going to be just that easy."

"And I'll stop an odious man from ruining people's lives. He has quite the history. Yes, it will be that easy. I have a plan." Sherlock practically smirked in self-satisfaction. "John, would it be too much trouble to ask for a glass of water? I did buy the groceries after all."

  


* * *

 

John S. Willoughby, personal assistant to Charles A. Milverton, opened the front door in answer to the doorbell.

"Yes?" he said to the man standing on the doorstep.

"Afternoon, sir. Stephen Escott, sir. The plumber." He practically beamed at Willoughby, the very picture of an eager-to-please, middle-class workman. And the smile on his face fell by degrees the longer he looked at John's nonplussed, somewhat annoyed expression. "You did call for a plumber. Right? Didn't you?" The man looked around nervously, as though looking for a way out of the situation.

"No, I'm afraid we didn't."

"This isn't Mr. Alex Coram's then – is it?"

"No, it isn't. You've made a mistake, I'm afraid."

The man…Escott?...bit his lip. "Oh, fuck." He ran a hand through his dark curls, a painfully anxious gesture. "Sorry. Damn. I mean. God, I'm sorry. It's just…I'm new at this job. And new in town. I keep mixing up street names. Sorry." He laughed sheepishly and looked John Willoughby straight in the eyes, and John had to stop himself from gasping out loud. This man's eyes were the most  _stunning_  he'd ever seen in a human face. And they were looking at him as though he, Escott, knew the greatest, grandest joke in the world and wanted to share it. With him, John Willoughby. Good Lord.

"Er, would it be too much trouble to ask for a glass of water?" he asked. "Sorry, but it's been so hot, and the A/C in the truck doesn't work. Please?" He smiled winningly – God, and what a smile. John  _knew_  that he probably was doing it on purpose, but he couldn't help himself. He also couldn't help noticing that the two top buttons of Escott's cotton-and-polyester shirt were undone, maybe, yes, because of the heat.

"Well. Uh. Sure. Come in." He led the plumber through to the kitchen of Charles Milverton's house, uncomfortably aware of how he seemed to be taking everything in, how his  _impossible_  eyes were darting around, taking note of everything. John hoped that he hadn't let a burglar in his boss's house just because, oh, because he was bloody gorgeous and had smiled at him.

"Nice place you have," said Escott as John poured him his water.

"It's not mine. I just work here. For my boss. He mostly works at home, so I work at his house." John laughed.  _Lame_ , he thought, helplessly, _so lame it didn't even become a proper joke before it died_.

"Oh." Escott smiled at him again as he reached for the glass, his fingers – long and slender - just brushing John's as he took it from him. "Thank you."

"You're welcome."

The plumber leaned against the kitchen sink, and drank. The entire glass. In one long, long draught. John could not fathom how such a commonplace act could be so _suggestive_. But it was. Stephen Escott drank with his head tilted back, fully exposing the column of his throat so that John could see how the muscles beneath the skin moved with every swallow. One hand toyed absently with an undone shirt button. A drop of water dribbled from the corner of his mouth, and trailed down his jaw to his neck. And when he was done, he closed his eyes, let out a, a satisfied  _sound_  that was almost a moan, and slowly ran his thumb along his exquisitely shaped upper lip to wipe the water off.

John Willoughby had known for quite a long time which way he was oriented, but even if he had been straight, he was preparing to bet that this would have set him batting for the other side in no time at all.

"You're a life-saver." Escott raised the glass with an inquisitive tilt of his head. "Where do you want this?"

"Just in the sink. I'll take care of it."

"All right, then." He put the glass in the sink, upset it, and set it upright again with a little chuckle and a quip about how clumsy he was.

 _His voice_ , thought Willoughby, the  _way his laugh sounds, warm and deep and rich, like…like a cello symphony of melted chocolate ._  He gave himself a mental shake. He did not know the man, probably would never meet him again, actually. He might not even  _want_  to meet him again. In all probability, the man would turn out to be perfectly vile upon further acquaintance.  _Must not think bad thoughts about the stranger in the kitchen. Must_ not _._

The stranger who he wasn't supposed to be thinking bad thoughts about was saying something. "Sorry? Didn't catch that."

"I said thanks. And that it was nice to meet you, Mister…?"

It took him a while to realize that Escott was asking for his name. "Ah. John Willoughby. Just John."

"It was nice meeting you, just John." The smile. Again. It was unfair that anyone could smile like that. "I'll leave you my card. If you ever need a plumber, call me."

"Right. I'll do that. Thanks."

"Pleasure was all mine. Afternoon." And Steven Escott winked at him as he closed the front door behind him.


	2. Chapter 2

John Watson couldn't hide that he was more than a little irritated by Sherlock's unwavering assumption that he'd do anything asked of him. But he had done the shopping. And there was the tea (what had happened to the biscuits, John did not want to know – Sherlock had said that he was bored, not that he had  _eaten_ them). So he stood up with a curt, "Right, yes, whatever you say" that hadn't come out quite as cuttingly sarcastic as he'd have liked. He supposed that he should be allowed some measure of impatience. Dealing with Sherlock could sometimes be worse than babysitting a particularly bloody-minded two-year-old.

_A bloody-minded two-year-old with a tendency to bring home dead things in various stages of decay and,_ thought John viciously as he filled a glass,  _a conviction that everybody else is stupid._ Which was, yes, a lot like the toddlers he knew, only in relation to Sherlock everybody else actually  _was_  stupid.

And John was shocked out of that train of thought by the kitchen sink.

The kitchen sink of 221B was the home to a veritable mountain of dirty… _things…_ that had probably stopped being dishes in the past couple of weeks. John refused to touch them out of respect for the new ecologies and, possibly civilizations and empires that had grown up among the bits of food and the remains of Holmesian experiments. And Sherlock, for the most part, just couldn't be bothered. His brain would probably stagnate fatally if he so much as soaped a teacup.

But the sink was clean now. There were still a couple of nasty looking beakers and flasks, but they were soaking in what smelled like a dilute solution of lemon-scented bleach. This was too much. For a brief, shining moment, John considered that maybe it could have been Mrs. Hudson, but she had said that she wouldn't do any more kitchen cleaning for them after a gooey mass of something had actually  _moved_ when she tried to throw it away. Sherlock, he decided, had to be possessed. By the spirit of an obsessive-compulsive housewife.

Considerably dazed, he turned to go back to the sitting room and found Sherlock leaning against the kitchen table (it was almost a relief to see that he hadn't bothered to move his improbable chemistry glassware from there). He nearly dropped the glass.

"God, you gave me a scare."

Sherlock gave a little sideways jerk of his head as if to say  _Eh, well, that's life for you_. "You were taking your time."

"I got distracted by the kitchen sink. Do you realize how many new species you might have killed when you cleaned that out?"

"An exaggeration."

"They probably had  _kingdoms_ , Sherlock, and  _written language._ "

"You're overreacting. I happen to need the sink." He reached over to take the glass of water from John, his fingers brushing against the doctor's as he did so.

"Civilization be damned then, eh?" John Watson meant to go back to his armchair and turn on the telly and maybe catch the news or something. He really did. But Sherlock somehow contrived to lean against the table in such a way that he blocked the entire space between that and the kitchen counter.

And then he drank. Everything. In one long, slow gulp.

John felt that it was the longest drink he had ever witnessed. And the singularly most uncomfortably sensual one. Sherlock had his head tilted back so that he could see how the muscles of his throat - further exposed by the top three buttons of his shirt being undone - moved with every swallow. A drop of water dribbled from the corner of his mouth, and trailed down his chin to his neck. And when he was done, he closed his eyes, let out a, a satisfied  _sound_ (John refused to categorize it as a moan), and slowly wiped his upper lip dry with a thumb. If it had been a woman in the same position, John was prepared to bet that he'd be a pretty happy, if slightly uncomfortable, man. As it was his male flatmate, however, it was just wrong.

Then Sherlock looked at him, his eyes for once not measuring, observing, deducing, somehow simply  _looking_ for once, and he handed the glass back. John took it with limp fingers.

"Thanks. You're a lifesaver. The heat's been deadly." Sherlock smiled, and it wasn't his I've-just-figured-it-out-and-I'm-a-pretty-self-satisfied-git smile, or his small, pleasant one, or even the one he used on Molly to get his chemicals and cadavers. It was practically predatory.

John took a few seconds to review the conversation they'd had at Angelo's, waiting for that mad cab driver to show up. Sherlock had said that women were not his area. And he'd said that he wasn't interested, wasn't looking for a relationship (and it still embarrassed John, deeply and unequivocally, that Sherlock had thought that he, John Watson, was trying to pick him up). Sherlock had also said that he knew that having a boyfriend was fine, though that bit came before he'd said he wasn't interested in anything that wasn't the work to which he was married. John didn't have any trouble with that. The cold hard fact of the matter was that Sherlock Holmes didn't think of anything but his work, and could thus not be trying to look…sexy, for lack of a better word…in front of his flatmate on purpose. It was probably just the heat.

"Did I do something wrong? Were you perhaps getting attached to your pets?"

" _My_  pets? If they were anybody's, Sherlock, they'd be yours. I don't think ordinary leftovers would do the things they did without your chemicals doing" –John waved his hands around for emphasis—" _things_  to them."

"Well, it was time for them to go. I needed the sink," Sherlock repeated. He turned sharply on his heel. "I'm going out, John, and you could wash out my glassware after it's soaked for another hour."

And John was left to contemplate life by himself.

* * *

 

That had been in the afternoon. Sherlock had returned in the early evening in considerably less impeccable clothes than those he had left in (John would have said workman's clothes if he hadn't known better), a set of well-used plumbing tools of all things, and dinner, Thai takeaway.

John had already managed to convince himself that he was being paranoid about what had transpired earlier – it was just a drink, for God's sake – but he couldn't help eyeing his flatmate askance over his Gang Panang.

Sherlock, however, didn't do anything else out of the ordinary - at least, nothing out of what was ordinary for  _him –_ that evening. When asked where he'd been, he said curtly that he'd been working, and he communicated nothing else about the matter, except for a smug grin when John inquired whether the said work was on his plan to crush Charles A. Milverton.

"I'll see if it works tomorrow, John. I've invested quite a lot in this venture, and stand to put in much more work, but it's the best line that I can take. I have several alternatives, of course, but this one's less risky than the rest, seeing as Milverton's not actually done anything criminal yet. Now shut up, I need to think." Whereupon Sherlock shouldered his violin and began to play discordantly, sending John up the stairs with his laptop to escape the noise.

He didn't manage to blog though, and spent most of the night worrying what his mad flatmate was up to now.

 

* * *

 

That evening, John Willoughby turned the plumber's card over in his hand. The kitchen sink had inexplicably clogged up that afternoon, and the man had said to call, and maybe someone he met personally was better than someone he'd pick out of the phone book, and Escott probably wouldn't get lost this time since he'd been to the house before, and damned if he wasn't sure he wouldn't have done something to block up the sink himself if it hadn't done so on its own.

Yes, he would give Escott a call. His boss needed a plumber. Escott was a plumber. And never mind the fact that he was gorgeous, or that John Willoughby got all hot and bothered just remembering the man drink.


	3. Chapter 3

John Watson awoke the next morning to a hideous surprise. Or rather he walked into it as he pottered blearily downstairs with vague notions of making himself breakfast, and maybe asking Sherlock if he wanted any, if he was up.

"Oh, Jesus." He stepped into a puddle of something he hoped was just water, because, whatever it was, it was a very big puddle, and he was standing in it in his bare feet. It took him a little while longer to realize that the puddle covered the entire floor, making it glisten slickly in the early morning sunlight. John stared dumbly at the sight, completely at a loss. He supposed he should be grateful that Sherlock (of course it had to be Sherlock, it couldn't have been the skull) had at least had the foresight to remove the electronics and papers and whatnot from the floor, even if it meant that they were now all piled haphazardly on every available raised surface in the room.

He found the perpetrator still in his pajamas, on his back on the kitchen floor, apparently dissecting the inner workings of the kitchen sink.

"What the  _hell_  are you doing, Sherlock?"

"I told you I needed the sink."

"You didn't tell me you were going to flood the flat!"

"Of course I didn't. You wouldn't have approved."

"You  _meant_ to?" John pinched the bridge of his nose, squeezed his eyes shut.  _God give me patience._

"Not the whole flat, though I did take precautions against the possibility. Pass me that wrench, will you? I've quite figured it out now."

John sloshed noisily through the mess on the kitchen floor, and put the wrench he found on the table into Sherlock's outstretched, expectant hand. How he resisted the temptation to brain Sherlock with it, he would never know. Well, it might have had something to do with the fact that Sherlock's head was under the kitchen sink, and it would have been hard to get the proper amount of swing under there to do any proper damage. Good Lord, was he starting to  _think_  like him?

"There was nothing wrong with the sink, Sherlock."

"You mean aside from the civilizations you were so attached to yesterday?"

"You know what I mean!"

"There was something wrong with it at around, oh, one in the morning. It's amazing how quickly a sink can go wrong."

" _What did you do to it_?"

"Calm down, John. I fixed it. At around one-thirty."

"Then what are you doing  _now_?"

"I fixed it too well. It was too clean. I needed to learn how to make a mess out of it, a credible mess."

"This is what you call a credible mess? The entire blinking flat?"

"Obviously, I had to have more than one go at it."

"Couldn't be bothered to clean up between tries, could you?"

"Umm, no. It was urgent."

"An experiment, eh?"

"Research, yes. If everything goes right, I'll be needing it today."

It was on the tip of John's tongue to ask why on earth Sherlock would need to know how to make a credible mess out of playing around with the kitchen plumbing, but he stopped himself. There were simply some things that he didn't need to know. And he didn't want to give Sherlock the idea that he was interested, or that his flooding of 221B could be justified. He set himself to making coffee.

"A cup for me too, please."

John froze in the act of putting the water into the coffeemaker. He bit back an acerbic retort and carried on. It was just a matter of a little more water, and a little more coffee after all. Getting all cross about it would get him nowhere, especially with Sherlock Holmes.  _Doormat_ , said a little voice inside his head.

"And when you're done with that, I need you to send a text."

' _I'm not your secretary, Sherlock.' Go on, say it._

"At your convenience, of course. There's no hurry. And not from the Blackberry, there's another phone on the mantelpiece."

"Okay."  _Doormat. Carpet. Rug. Coconut matting._

_Shut up,_ John Watson told the voice.  _I'm being an exceptionally nice and patient human being._

_Bathroom tile._

He squelched into the sitting room, and picked up what he supposed was the phone Sherlock meant. It was a cheap model, a little worn and battered. Even he could tell - from the little scratches on its faceplate, the way the figures on the keypad were all blurry from being used so often – that it was obviously  _someone's_  phone. Someone who wasn't entirely well-to-do. Heavens. He  _was_  starting to think like his flatmate, which was, to be honest, more than a little disturbing.

"What do you want me to send?"

"'Sorry for the late reply,'" dictated Sherlock – was he still beneath the kitchen sink? "'I think I can squeeze you in today. Please call about the details. S.E.' Done yet? Yes, S.E., not S.H., I know what I'm saying. There's just one number in there, send it to that."

The one entry in the phone was for a J.W. John – even though common sense told him otherwise – took a moment to see if it was his number. It wasn't.

"Have you sent it?"

John thumbed the keys hurriedly. "Done. Are you going to tell me what this is all about?"

"Eventually."

The doctor swore under his breath. Sherlock, despite all the water on the floor, despite all the sloshing and splashing he should have made, had managed to ghost up behind him. It was very disconcerting. He hadn't even heard the dripping noises he should have been making, given that he was sopping wet from his sojourn underneath the sink.

"You needn't have checked the number. Of course it wasn't yours."

"You never know."

"Though I should have expected you to be curious given the initials. Right." And then Sherlock took his shirt off.

It was something that never got any better, no matter how many times John would review the situation later on. A dripping wet Sherlock, more than a little grimy from mucking around with the plumbing things for more than six hours. Had taken, practically peeled, his sopping wet shirt off. In front of his flatmate, John Watson, perfectly straight, M.D. There were no theatrics involved, unlike (oh God, it burned his optic nerves to remember) the drink of water, and Sherlock simply stalked off afterwards, making the appropriate splashing noises this time, taking his sodden shirt with him. John tried to tell himself that it was a perfectly ordinary thing to do, this taking off of wet shirts in front of other people. Men did it all the time when they played basketball or football, let's say, on a warm day. A perfectly ordinary thing.

"I'll clean up," called Sherlock from his bedroom. "Just let me shower." He emerged from there wearing only, as far as John could tell, a dark blue towel thrown hastily around his waist. "Just keep my coffee in the pot, I'll get to it later. Thanks."

And his mouth quirked into a small smile, different from the ingratiating ones he used shamelessly on Molly, but appallingly, disturbingly similar to them all the same. He turned to go to the bathroom, and John felt that he would be scarred for life by the sight of the towel almost, _almost_  fluttering open.

He downed his own coffee in one go, and left in a mad rush to find breakfast somewhere that wasn't 221B Baker Street.


	4. Chapter 4

_Hi. It's John Willoughby from this morning. My boss needs a plumber. Could you please come tomorrow?_

John Willoughby went through the text over and over in his head. It had been agonizing to write. He had dithered forever choosing between 'Hi' and 'Hello,' and had even briefly considered using 'Hey.' And then he had worded and re-worded it.

_Hi. It's John Willoughby from the house you got lost at_ … _Hi, it's John Willoughby, I gave you a glass of water…Hi. It's John Willoughby, I watched you_ drink that glass of water _…Hi, I'm John S. Willoughby, I don't know if you even remember the name but I watched you_ drink a glass of water _and I can't get it out of my head and I am now sitting here pretty damn much consumed with lust and_ I don't even know you….

And then he had fretted over whether or not he should actually send it.

_Escott had said to call, not text. But it was nine in the evening. It probably wasn't right to call a strange man at nine in the evening, if it wasn't an emergency, even if it was about business. Better to send a text. But it probably said somewhere that it was impolite to send business texts at nine in the evening. And why did John have to send the text anyway? A leaking drain was not an emergency, what would that look like? 'Please, it's urgent, you need to come, you have to help me with my leaky plumbing' ohgodthatsoundedsowrong Texting, no,_ calling _could definitely wait until morning. But didn't it make sense? John's boss had asked him to hire a plumber, and doing something about that immediately was only the proper,_ professional  _thing to do. So send the damn thing. Come on, thumb, press 'send.' Wait, but …_

He had finally managed to send it by holding his phone upside down, at arm's length, and squeezing his eyes shut as he pressed the appropriate button.

And then he had waited for the answer. To his credit, he did not pounce on his phone at every single suggestionof a message alert tone. But when the reply actually did arrive, at seven in the morning when he was just cleaning up after a hasty breakfast at Mr. Milverton's,  _then_ he pounced.

_Sorry for the late reply. I think I can squeeze you in today. Please call about the details. S.E._

Before he could let himself dither, John frantically thumbed the series of buttons that would make the call happen.

The phone rang. It rang again. It rang several more times. John was beginning to think that maybe he should just try again during proper office hours when Stephen Escott picked up.

"Hello?" The deep voice was a little breathy, as if Escott had just been in a bit of a rush to get to his phone.

"Good morning. Mister Escott?"

"Speaking. Sorry about the wait. I was in the shower." John tried very hard not to think about that. He did. He really did.

"Oh. Dear. I am so sorry."

"It's fine. What can I do for you, Mister Willoughby?"

"Ah. My boss's kitchen sink, you see. The drain's clogged, and he wants it fixed."

"Right."

"That – that's about it, really."

"Blocked drain. I can pop around to have a look at it at least. Would four this afternoon be all right?"

"Yes, sure. Thank you."

"Splendid. This is the house I was at yesterday? I think I can find it again, but if you could text me the address…?"

"Yes. Of course. Thanks."

"Oh no, Mister Willoughby, thank  _you_. I'll see you later."

John told himself that he was imagining the deep, delicious purr in Escott's voice.

xxx

Stephen Escott was prompt, and very proud at not having lost his way.

"It was a near thing though," he said as John Willoughby let him in. "Made a bad left turn, but I realized it before I went too far." He beamed at John, a very friendly, perfectly ordinary smile. "What do you have for me?"

John showed him to the kitchen, and left him there when Mr. Milverton called for him – but not before getting a good look at Escott's bum as he got down on his hands and knees to inspect the pipes beneath the sink. He had a nice ass. If there was a God, thought John as he walked away, he would not have put nice asses on this earth if they weren't meant to be ogled a little.

He came back an hour later, after placing a couple of phone calls and sending a few emails for his boss, to get himself a Coke from the fridge.

"You doing okay, Mister Escott?" he asked, popping open the can. The plumber was on his back on the kitchen floor, head, arms and shoulders out of sight in the space beneath the kitchen sink.

"Hm? Yes, yes, I'm fine, thank you."

"It's strange, you know. About the sink. It just clogged up all of a sudden. I mean, usually I notice the water going down slower a couple of days before it actually stops up. It was fine until yesterday afternoon."

"Oh, I don't know about that, Mr. Willoughby. It's amazing how fast a kitchen sink can go wrong. Mind where you step. I'm afraid I've made a bit of a mess."

"What? Oh." John stepped into a puddle as he went to put his empty can in the garbage bin (yes, to throw the can away, not to see how Escott's T-shirt was stretched over his chest). He looked down at his shoes with some dismay. They were rather expensive, and he wasn't sure they'd survive getting wet.

"I told you to mind the mess." Escott pulled himself out from beneath the sink with a little grunt at the effort. He was dripping wet, dark curls slicked down, jeans dark and heavy with water, shirt sticking wetly to his chest.

"It's – it's fine." John gave a weak laugh. "I wasn't paying attention."

Escott raised an eyebrow. (Was that a playful twinkle in his eye?  _Was it?_ ) "I'll take care of it," he said, pushing his damp curls out of his eyes. "I'm almost done here. Though – and this embarrasses me deeply – your sink's not quite good to go yet. It needs a kind of fixture I don't have on me at the moment." He took his shirt off. "I'll have to come back. Would tomorrow morning be all right?"

He took his shirt off.

_He took his shirt off_.

John Willoughby opened and closed his mouth dumbly like a fish. He couldn't even try not to stare. Escott was standing there, holding his shirt,  _just standing there,_  like it was the most natural thing in the world, to be standing shirtless and dripping wet in someone else's kitchen. And he was on the lean side, perhaps 'trim' would be a better word, but well-built, with muscles that came mostly from honest physical work instead of pumping iron. And he was wet, and more water was dripping from his hair onto his shoulders, and running down his chest, and John wondered why it was that someone being sopping wet was so  _hot_ , really, if this was a cheap porno, he'd probably be snogging him heavily by now, oh God, had he actually thought that, and, yes, Stephen Escott was still standing there, still shirtless, still wet, looking at him with a question in his impossible eyes (what color  _were_  they?) because he had been staring like an idiot for what felt like forever, and not saying anything.

"Ah." He tried again. "Sorry, Mister Escott, what?"

"I asked if it would be all right if I came back tomorrow morning." There was laughter in Escott's voice, and maybe just a hint of satisfaction. John wanted to run away and bury his head in the ground. There was no way that he couldn't have noticed that he, John, had been staring, and if the plumber had half a brain, he'd also have noticed  _how_  John had been staring. Oh, bollocks. "There's a fixture I need that I don't have right now, but I'll have it tomorrow and your sink will be as good as new in just two shakes."

"Ah. Sure. Tomorrow morning would be fine. Maybe nine o'clock?"

"Brilliant. And just Stephen, please, if you're still just John." He began to dry himself off with a towel he must have brought with him. He had a towel. Just like what the  _Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy_ recommended. John couldn't keep from grinning at that.

"Yeah, I guess, I am just John." He stopped trying to keep from smiling, and felt his face relax. He hadn't realized that he'd been wanting to smile for a while now. "Do you want to pop your things in the dryer? It shouldn't take a moment."

_Yes, please, say yes, and then you can traipse about in just your underwear._

"Well. I'd be a right fool if I didn't have a spare set of clothes in the truck, but that would be uncommonly kind of you. If it's not too much trouble, of course." Escott, no,  _Stephen_  smiled, as he rubbed at his hair with the towel.

Just a little while later, Stephen handed John his wet clothes (even, and John blushed to think of it, his white cotton briefs) from behind the door of the downstairs bathroom. Presumably, the man was changing into his spare clothes. As John watched the clothes spin round and round in the dryer, he thought that he had never been so pleased to do laundry in his life.

xxx

John Watson told himself he was being silly. He'd thought things over during his breakfast at a small café that wasn't Speedy's, and he'd come to the conclusion that he was just being jumpy. It wasn't as if he hadn't seen other people, other men naked before. For heaven's sake, the boys on the rugby team used to pull the underpants off the people who were too shy to shower completely starkers after practice, and he hadn't thought of anything of it back then (though that was at uni, when he was being young and stupid). And it was Sherlock Holmes, after all. It probably didn't occur to him that what he was doing would be sending the wrong social cues (ha, understatement of the year!). He'd heard Molly at the lab say that she'd once tried to ask him out for coffee and he'd taken it to mean that she was asking if he'd like coffee to be made for him. You could expect anything from a man like that.

Yes, that was it, thought John as he settled down to read the evening paper. Sherlock was just being his normal sociopathic self (and he'd googled sociopathy, too, if only for him to be able to say that he'd done his research). He heard the front door open, and the tread of feet going up the stairs.

"Ah, good, you're here," said his flatmate, by way of greeting as he stepped into the sitting room. He was carrying the plumbing tools again.

"Good evening to you, too, Sherlock," John answered dryly.

Sherlock ignored the tone. He dropped the tools beside the armchair, and shrugged off the jacket he had on instead of his usual coat.

"Fancy some dinner? I'm starving."

"I thought you didn't eat while you were working a case."

"And I thought you were the one nattering at me to develop healthier eating habits. There's a new Indian restaurant that I want to try."

"Good for you, then." John turned the page of his paper, and then something clicked into place. "You're asking me out to dinner?"

"Well, I thought I'd check if you wanted any, and since you don't have any work to do, and are apparently uninspired with regards to your blogging, I thought that maybe you'd like to come with me. Also, there isn't anything good on the telly, since you've been through all the channels twice in under ten minutes, and there isn't anything remotely interesting to you in the paper. Sarah's busy tonight, so you can't ask her out or pop over to her place. You've been thinking you could do with some air, as you've put your shoes on, but you don't know where to go, as evidenced by the fact that you sat back down to go through the paper, maybe in the vague hope to see if it recommends anything, maybe in the vaguer hope of finding something to occupy you." Sherlock smiled, and John was relieved to see that it was his old, look-at-me-I'm-brilliant one. " _God_ , that felt good."

In spite of the fact that Sherlock's habit of taking everything apart and analyzingthe pieces could be maddening, and intrusive, and, frankly, rude, it never failed to amaze John that a human brain could do all that. He grinned at Sherlock, and wondered how he could have imagined, even for a second, that he'd been trying to seduce him. "You sound like you've been holding that in all day."

"You have no idea. Come on, John, it's a small place, we might run out of seats."

It  _was_  a small place, and crowded, but the food was good. Sherlock actually seemed to be happy, as though he had the greatest secret in the world. He was more relaxed than he'd been in a while, and he cracked jokes, and even appeared interested when John had started to talk about movies ("Jedi  _what_?" "No, please, don't tell me you haven't seen  _Star Wars,_ too."). They'd walked home, and when John sidestepped to avoid a used condom on the sidewalk, Sherlock had made him laugh, as he wrinkled his nose and said in a completely deadpan voice, "Well, at least they're being  _smart_  about something."

It had, John reflected, actually been fun. He'd probably take Sarah to the same restaurant the next time they went out. And for once, he hadn't had to cringe in embarrassment at his flatmate's complete and utter disregard for tact, as was usually the case when he and Sherlock went out together for food. In fact, Sherlock had almost behaved normally. Who'd have thought that he could do that? Almost normal. Almost, actually as if…they'd been out…on a date…

… _oh fuck._


	5. Chapter 5

"Hi, Harry? It's me."

"I  _know_  it's you, John. God, it took you long enough to call!"

"Sorry."

"And I even gave you the phone, and everything! You calling was the whole point. Or texting. Or something. Answering  _my_  calls. Keeping in touch, you know."

John tactfully refrained from pointing out that a large part of his having been given the phone had been the very angry, very drunken argument that had ended with Harry walking out on Clara. Well, one of those fights. A particularly bad one.

"Look, it's a bit of an emergency." He took a deep breath, looked around his room to make sure no-one was listening (yes, it was just him in there but it never hurt to be cautious), and barreled on. "How do you know if a guy's trying to come on to you?"

Harry laughed, a loud, screaming laugh of pure delight that had John holding the phone away from his ear. "Are you suddenly turning gay, bro?"

"No, I'm not!"

"It would be rich if you were. We'd be the end of the Watsons, the two of us. It's  _funny_ , John, it really is, lighten up a bit, will you?"

"It's not funny from where I'm standing, Harry."

"Why are you asking me anyway? I like women, in case you haven't noticed."

"You used to have boyfriends."

"Why  _are_ you asking at all, actually?"

"It's – my flatmate." John shrugged helplessly. "He's been - it's been a very weird week."

"What, the mad detective bloke you blog about?"

"I - yes, Harry. Sherlock, his name's Sherlock."

"You think he's trying to come on to you?"

" _Brilliant_  deduction, Harry."  _Christ_ , did he actually say that? "Sorry. I'm just a bit on edge here."

"Yeah, well, I love you, too. So. Your mad detective flatmate named Sherlock. What's he doing then, prancing about in front of you naked?"

"Er." John had an unpleasant flashback of the fluttering blue towel. Several of his neurons must have died passing it on. "Well. Almost. He just had a towel on." He wanted to mention the drink of water, but knew that he couldn't possibly explain the gravity of it. "Look, I'm sorry, it's probably nothing, I don't even know why I called."

"Well, I'm glad you did." A note of reproach crept into Harry's voice. It made John feel guilty, and he wanted to kick himself. "But listen, if he's just walking around in his nuddy-pants, there might be nothing to it. You're  _flatmates_. Aren't you bound to see each other naked eventually? And is he cute, by the way?"

_Nuddy-pants?_ Was that even a word? "If there is something that Sherlock is definitely not, it is cute. And I thought you didn't care about boys."

"I'm trying to imagine what you'd look like with a guy. So he's not cute then, but is he hot?"

" _Harry_!"

"Anything else aside from his walking around in a towel?"

"Well, he did the shopping. He  _never_  does the shopping. And he made me tea, even if he must've done something strange to the biscuits. And we went to dinner last night and…" He didn't know if he could explain how strange it was that Sherlock had acted almost normal.

"You think your flatmate might be gay, and might be trying to come onto you, and you went to dinner with him? John Watson, what the  _hell_? Did you shag him afterwards?"

"I was hungry!"

"So  _you_  shagged  _him_?"

"No!"

"Kiss, then, did you kiss?"

" _For God's sake, Harry_!"

"You did nothing?"

"Well, no, we didn't." But it had been fun. If it had been a date, a first date, there would have been a second one. John really did not want to go there.

"Hmph." Harry was quiet for a while, as if this was a disappointment to her. "How long has it been since you got laid?"

" _Harry!"_

"All right, all right! Listen, this Sherlock of yours, is I think, perfectly entitled to go around his own flat dressed however he likes, and if you happen to be his flatmate, so much the worse for you, but it doesn't mean that he's trying a come-hither. And flatmates do go out to dinner together. It's something that happens. That's what I think."

"Right." John took a deep breath. "Right. Thanks, Harry."

"No problem. I'm glad you called."

"How are things?"

"They're – well – they're things. They're all right. I guess. Considering."

It was on the tip of John's tongue to ask about Clara, but he remembered just in time that he shouldn't.

"Anyway, it's been good talking to you, bro. I'm going to be late. You ought to be proud of me. I'm going to my therapist."

"That's – I hope it helps, Harry."

"Right, yeah, whatever. Don't be a stranger. Call me, even if you don't think your mad detective flatmate Sherlock isn't trying to seduce you. And, John?"

"Yes?"

"I want you to know that it'd be totally cool with me if you were gay."

"I'm not!"

"Just saying. You know I love you. Bye!"


	6. Chapter 6

Sherlock had apparently spent the night watching movies. John Watson came downstairs after phoning Harry to find him with his knees up on one of the armchairs, surrounded by discarded nicotine patches and DVD cases. He was also halfway throughwhat looked like  _Memoirs of a Geisha_.

"I don't understand how people  _stand_  this drivel," he said. "There's no logic to it!"

"'Cause we're stupid and easily entertained. Did you sleep at all?"

Sherlock made a disgusted sound. "I might as well have. I swear my brain feels half dead already."

"Ah, well, welcome to what it's like in our funny little brains, then. Where did you get all these?"

"I borrowed some of them from Mrs. Hudson."

"Even  _Rambo_?"

"Which one's that?"

John held up the DVD.

"I said some of them, John. Though I'm not sure where that came from. I wasn't paying attention. It could be hers."

John had a sudden mental picture of Mrs. Hudson spending a quiet evening watching a muscle-bound Sylvester Stallone running through the jungle killing people. He looked at the stack of as yet unwatched DVDs – which is to say the ones that weren't open and tossed aside like so many discarded empty clam shells – to purge the image from his mind.  _Rambos II_ ,  _III_ and  _IV_  were sandwiched between  _Breakfast at Tiffany's_ and _Gone with the Wind_. Good Lord.

"Is this for your case then?"

"Of course it is. Why else do you think I'd subject myself to this, this  _utter_  nonsense?" Sherlock stopped the film with a dramatic sweep of the remote control. "God, no wonder so many people are idiots. Do you actually  _like_  any of this?"

"I like a good comedy."

"Really? And those James Bond films you feel so strongly about?"

"They're classics!"

"Which is, I take it, supposed to be an excuse for a fistfight taking place  _on_  a flying aeroplane with an open door. But I will concede that that fight in the train compartment was passable, even if a choke wire thin enough to be concealed in a watch would hardly be a viable weapon."

"Please don't try to destroy my childhood, Sherlock."

"I've got time to look through one more of these things. Pick one out for me, will you."

John fed  _Monty Python's Life of Brian_ into the DVD player. He figured that the worst that could happen would be Sherlock actually enjoying it. His flatmate sat in complete silence as the film played, brushing off John's inquiry as to whether he'd like some toast ("I ate last night, I'm okay for a bit"). Eventually, he unfolded himself from his seat, stretched, and declared he was going out. John wondered if he was imagining things, or if it really was Sherlock humming  _Always Look on the Bright Side of Life_  as he left the flat.

xxx

Charles Milverton had a meeting with the editors of the  _Sun_  that morning. Before he left, he told John Willoughby to make an appointment with his lawyer ('one of those little bit-part actresses is crying libel') and to makes sure that the plumber finished today. John wasn't sure how Mr. Milverton thought he'd manage that. Stand over him threateningly while he worked? Not that there wasn't a certain appeal to that idea…

Stephen Escott arrived a little after nine. He was, to John's mind, disappointingly quick about fixing up the sink.

"I told you it wouldn't take two shakes," he said, wiping his hands clean. "I'll just send the bill over, right?"

"Yes," said John, sipping at the tea he had made while the plumber had been working. He supposed that sort of counted as making sure that he finished up. "Make it out to C.A. Milverton please."

"I'll do that." Stephen stopped packing away his tools, looked in John's direction. "I know a nice Indian restaurant. Seeing as –  _if_  you aren't doing anything tonight, we could have dinner."

John snorted his tea.

"Or maybe you'd rather Thai. Though you did strike me as the type who would fancy Indian."

"I. Well. Er. Um. Well. Um. Er."

"You're interested." Stephen fixed him with a look, a piercing, satisfied, almost  _arrogant_  look, as if he was just daring John to prove him wrong. "I _know_ you are."

He laughed weakly. "Was I that obvious?"

"The extra cup of tea was a bit of a giveaway. That and other things." The plumber suddenly smiled, effectively erasing all traces of his previous, frankly alarming expression. "I'm  _kidding_. It's good you  _are_  interested, otherwise I'd have to be very ashamed of myself."

"And," said John, hardly daring to believe it, "you're – you're actually interested back? In me, I mean?"

"Obviously. Or I wouldn't have asked." Stephen flicked his case of tools shut, fastened the clasps. "I'll have to skip the tea, though, thank you. I have work to see to. But I'll see  _you_  tonight. Around eight, if you'll be free by then. You are? Good. I'll text you. Good morning, just John."

 

xxx

A blatant assumption of mutual interest was hardly the most flattering way to be asked out by a near-stranger, even if the near-stranger in question had already been seen shirtless. John Willoughby was, however, not going to let that dampen his spirits. He hadn't been out in a while, and, shallow truth be told, it had been a very long time since he'd been out with someone as positively scrumptious as Stephen Escott.

And he cleaned up nicely, too. Very nicely. When they met, as arranged, outside the restaurant, Stephen was wearing a smart black jacket over a purple silk shirt and impeccably tailored black trousers, and he looked more at home in them than he did in his ordinary clothes. John suddenly felt very shabby in comparison, and he found himself shuffling his feet in their rather expensive – and what now felt like rather shoddy - shoes.

"Ah, John, there you are." Stephen's face broke into a smile, and he put an arm around John's shoulders. "I was starting to think you wouldn't show. Come on, it's a small place, we might have to fight for seats."

They didn't have to fight for a table, though it might have been a near thing given how full the place was. The food was good (John  _was_  partial to Indian cuisine, damned if he knew how Stephen had guessed), and somehow the crowd wasn't a deterrent to conversation. They talked about work. Stephen was very keenly interested in what he did for a living, even if, as John put it, he was just a sort of glorified errand boy. Well, he supposed that it was rather interesting to other people if you worked for someone who could diss on what Keira Knightley was wearing in several publications and get away with it. He lay out the details for all he was worth, making it last, hoping he made it sound interesting. And they talked about movies (Stephen liked movies, and his favorites were the ones by Alfred Hitchcock of all things), and music (Stephen liked the classical stuff, who'd have thought?), and other, innumerable, little things. Like the infinite intricacies of curry spices. To John's mind, there was just good curry, bad curry, and acceptable, I'll-eat-it-because-it's-there curry. Stephen knew all sorts of things about the spices, and how they were put together, and how they were cooked, and presumably John was supposed to know all these things too, now that Stephen had told him, only he had stopped paying attention at some point and had simply started to listen to the perfect, dark chocolate richness of his voice.

It was almost as if he was a teenager on a first date (the very first date, the first date before all other first dates with other people who were not your  _first_  first date). He was giddy, and there was a sort of heady rush that made him smile, and laugh too easily, like when he dropped a bit of lamb that he was trying to put into his mouth, but it was okay, because it was happy laughter, not nervous laughter, and it was glorious. It was nearly like being drunk but there was hardly any alcohol involved, just what they had with dinner. It was  _glorious_.

Stephen walked with John back to his flat. It was a rather long walk, but John didn't mind that at all, not when it was a nice evening, and he was walking home with a damn fine-looking, intelligent (who'd have thought!), wonderful man, even if he did have to hurry a little to match his stride.

"Thank you," he said, when they reached his front door. "Really, thank you. Tonight was wonderful. I can't remember when I've had such fun just over dinner."

"I'm glad you did." Stephen quirked a small smile at him. "Because I'm asking you out again. Tomorrow, if you're available."

"I'll  _make_  myself available." John felt a giddy-happy grin spread over his face. And because it felt right, he went forward and a little upward (because Stephen was taller than he was) with the very firm intention of kissing Stephen Escott.

Who gave a start and went backwards, very fast.

"I don't – kiss," he said awkwardly. Then he laughed. "Not on the first date."

John grabbed the other man's jacket by the lapels and pulled him close. Stephen's eyes went wide, and his lips parted in surprise. The sight sent a hot fluttering, knotting, unfurling sensation through the base of John's stomach. He leaned forward, amazed at how he, mousy, just mildly attractive, average  _him_ , was daring to do what he was planning to do, and he breathed his next words over Stephen Escott's skin.

"Well, I do."


	7. Chapter 7

John Watson came home late that night. He had met up with Bill Murray and a few other guys he knew from the army for a few drinks. He liked the confirmation that that he wasn't the only one who had made it home, that people he knew and liked were safe, and were, if not perfectly okay, at least on their way to getting there. And he genuinely enjoyed their company (if he had avoided them like the plague during his first weeks back in England, well, put that down to a black cloud of self-pity and depression). They had had a roaring good time – a very  _loud_  good time. John had thought they were in danger of being kicked out of the pub, especially when the boys had started a rousing cheer for John 'Three Continents' Watson.

John chuckled at the thought as he climbed up the stairs of 221B. He hadn't known whether to laugh or be ashamed of the juvenile company he kept, and had ended up downing a pint than he meant to,  _very_  fast. But 'Three Continents' Watson could hold his alcohol, thank you very much.

It was also, he reflected, nice to know there was a normal world out there that he was part of. One that didn't have murderous taxi drivers, or secret messages, or evil Chinese smuggling gangs who kidnapped you and your date when under the impression that you were a certain high-functioning sociopath…

Speaking of the sociopath, Sherlock had come home that morning with a boxed set of Alfred Hitchcock DVDs (why was John not surprised?) and, yes, singing  _Always Look on the Bright Side of Life_. Very softly, under his breath, but John had heard him all the same, and he counted it as a small but definite victory. The consulting detective had then gone on to have a Hitchcock marathon. John had left him perched on a chair, knees drawn to his chin, keeping up a steady muttering on how improbable it all was. He wondered if Sherlock was still there. It wouldn't have surprised him to find his flatmate in the exact same position, only partway through  _To Catch a Thief_  instead of just starting  _The Birds_.

But he wasn't there. At all. Anywhere. And all the lights in the flat were off.

"Sherlock?" Something felt deeply wrong. It did not help John's feelings that there were a good number of people who'd want his flatmate dead (starting, maybe, with half of Scotland Yard). He felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end, even as he told himself that it was more than likely that Sherlock had just gone to the bathroom or his bedroom or maybe even out for a walk…

"Sherlock!"

"You seem very jumpy, is something wrong?" And there he was, in his blue dressing gown, standing in the doorway where John was prepared to swear he hadn't been a second ago. He was ridiculously relieved that Sherlock  _was_ there all the same.

"Oh, there you are. No, no, nothing's the matter at all."

"You were worried." Sherlock moved, catlike,  _insinuating_ himself into the room, rather than simply entering it. "Anxious. For my safety. That was nice of you. A valid concern, I'll admit, given the kind of enemies I make, and that I have the British government for a brother. You failed, however, to notice that I was clearly still in the flat, and unharmed. But I shouldn't be surprised." He was very close to John now, and the doctor was beginning to wonder if he should find the proximity worrying. Sherlock sniffed. "You're slightly inebriated – bound to miss things in that state, not that you wouldn't miss them ordinarily. Why, though, hm?" He peered closely at John, who decided that he was starting to find this disturbing, and that maybe he should start moving backwards. "You've been out with your army friends. Perhaps the reminder of having once been in combat has you spoiling for some kind of action, and it wouldn't help that I haven't needed your help on a case for weeks. Your instinct is always to do something energetic. Or perhaps you feel the need to prove yourself, to show that you can still be a hero even if you've been invalided home. But that still doesn't quite cover all of it, now, does it? No, not your _panic_ , not that you were  _frightened_  that something, something bad might have happened to me.  _Oh_."

Sherlock's eyes went wide, and he was close enough for John to see the dark fleck in the iris of his left eye, just above the pupil, and he didn't  _want_  to be close enough to see it, but he couldn't go backwards any further because his back had met something solid. He could also smell the more than faint whiff of alcohol coming off his flatmate. And, with rising horror, because he was trying to look anywhere  _but_ Sherlock's face, he saw, in the sitting room, half on the table, a discarded purple shirt, and a similarly discarded pair of black trousers and, please God, those couldn't be underpants.

"Of  _course_. How could I have missed it? You killed a man for me just the day after we met. And here you are, still living with a lunatic. My dear John Watson." His lips curved into a dangerous smile.

John knew for a fact that he did not want to be Sherlock's dear anything. He doubted very much that  _Sherlock_  wanted him to be his dear anything. And he wanted very much to run away, but Sherlock had apparently lost all awareness of the concept of personal space, and the solid something against his back – the bookshelves, it was the bookshelves – was maddeningly refusing to open magically into Narnia.

"Sherlock, I think, I really, really think that you're drunk. And I think that we would both be much, much happier if you -"

He meant to tell his flatmate to stick his stupid head in a bucket of cold water. He really did. He was prevented from doing so by Sherlock grabbing his wrists, pinning him to the bookshelves, and, and…

Sherlock's mouth was pressed against his, hot and insistent, and because he had been talking and unguarded when it happened, or maybe just because Sherlock was preternaturally fast, his own mouth was open, and Sherlock's tongue was in it, exploring, teasing,  _tasting_ , and Sherlock tasted of white wine and curry and, very, very faintly, of tobacco smoke (was that the ghost of a dead habit, or had he been indulging in a cigarette on the sly?), and it was actually a good kiss, a good, forceful, I'm-going-to-have-my-way-with-you- _now_  kiss, and John liked being on the receiving end of those, he liked him a bad girl, but it was Sherlock, it was Sherlock, it was  _Sherlock_ , he was being kissed by Sherlock bloody I'm-married-to-my-work Holmes, and, oh God, Sherlock's tongue flickered in his mouth, coaxing him to participate, and, really, if it hadn't been Sherlock, it would have been a  _good_  kiss, and who'd have thought he was so strong, he couldn't move his hands, couldn't push Sherlock away, and he wanted to struggle, because he didn't  _want_  this, oh  _God_ , to hell with tying cherry stalks into knots, what the  _hell_  was that, but when he started to squirm, Sherlock pressed against him, and he was made uncomfortably aware of the fact that Sherlock was wearing  _nothing_ underneath the dressing gown, and that it would be a drastic,  _drastic_  understatement to say that Sherlock was getting turned on by this, and Sherlock began to move his body against his, but he didn't stop the kissing, just moaned into John's mouth as he pressed against him, and it wouldn't have been unpleasant if it had been Sarah, or a woman with  _breasts_ , not a…oh, shit, what was that, that just missed them, Sherlock had an entire set of the Encyclopaedia Britannica up there, that could be fatal, and how long was Sherlock going to do this, didn't he need to  _breathe_ , John was starting to run out of air, oh sweet, merciful  _God_ , he was doing that thing with his tongue again…

And suddenly, inexplicably, Sherlock pulled away, let go of John's hands. His pale skin was flushed, he was breathing heavily, and he was still close enough for John to see that his pupils were dilated, the extraordinary irises mere slivers of color. He smiled slowly, a silly, smug, satisfied expression that John wanted to punch off of his face, and then he swayed ponderously sideways, once, twice, before falling over in an undignified drunken faint.

John stood stock still for several seconds, not knowing what to make of it. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, wiped his hand on his jacket. He was uncomfortable that he wasn't certain how much of the spit was his, and how much was Sherlock's. He was also uncomfortable with the fact that he wasn't sure just how much he  _hadn't_ kissed Sherlock back. And, since he seemed to be making a list, he was uncomfortable that his flatmate was entirely under the wrong impression about him and actively after him; that he was alone in the flat with said flatmate; that said flatmate was unconscious, but he supposed that was better than Sherlock being awake at this point; and that that had actually been a very good kiss.

He looked at Sherlock. He picked up the fallen book - it  _was_  the Encyclopaedia Britannica, Volume IV – and put it back on the shelf. He looked at Sherlock again. John supposed he could just leave him there, in a crumpled heap on the rug – and he'd deserve it, too – but it wouldn't have been the decent thing to do, and John had decency burned into his soul like a brand. So, cursing and being extremely careful of the placement of the dressing gown, he half carried, half dragged his flatmate to the sofa and dumped him there unceremoniously, half on and half off, in a position that was almost guaranteed to produce a stiff neck in the morning (decency had its limits). Sherlock began to snore.

John spared just enough thought to notice the bottle of white wine on the coffee table – it was expensive Spanish stuff, trust Sherlock to get drunk on high-quality alcohol – before deciding that he'd had enough to do with thinking that night. He was going to go to bed. He was going to take a cold shower, and then go to bed. A very cold shower. Yes.

If he hadn't decided to do away with the thinking, John just might have noticed that the bottle of wine was only a very tiny little bit less than full.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And there is [art for this chapter! By the magnificent khorazir, no less!](http://khorazir.tumblr.com/post/34651676823/bookshelf-inspired-by-the-hilarious-the#note-container)
> 
> (The fact that this exists always surprises and delights me every time I _remember_ it, and that makes me want to spin around and bake fucking fantastic cookies for _everyone_.)


	8. Chapter 8

It took John Watson an understandably long time to fall asleep. He would start to doze off, remember the things Sherlock Holmes had done to his mouth, and then sit up fully awake, with an almost violent urge to brush his teeth. The third time he tottered back to bed with his teeth, tongue and the insides of his cheeks scrubbed clean and minty fresh, it began to dawn on him that he was probably being ridiculous. The fifth time it happened, he figured that he might as well give up on sleep and make himself a nice, calming cup of tea. This idea was appealing until he remembered that Sherlock was asleep downstairs, and what if he woke up? (He could hit him over the head with the boiling hot kettle, that's what.  _No_.) So stayed in bed, tossing and turning until he finally drifted off.

He slept fitfully, with vague, uncomfortable dreams. Somewhere, though, these were replaced by nicer things, like the suggestion of the smell of the tea he hadn't made for himself, an impression of comfortable warmth, and the sensation of a gentle finger tracing lazy circles on his stomach…

Which was  _not_  a dream. Alarms, somewhat heavy and dulled with sleepiness, began to go off in his head.

"You're awake." The words were whispered so close to his ear that the warm accompanying breath tickled. "Or almost there. Finally. Good morning, John."

John's eyes snapped open. He saw the ceiling. Ceilings were good. Ceilings were normal. Ceilings, however, did not remove the  _not_  good and  _not_  normal fact that Sherlock was lying on his side, next to him,  _on his bed_. Somewhere in his muzzy, muddled, just-awake consciousness, he supposed he should be thankful that at least Sherlock was wearing pajamas.

"I apologize for my atrocious behavior last night," he said, continuing to draw feather-light patterns on the surface of John's T-shirt. Then his finger began to spiral lower. John's breath caught in his throat as Sherlock's hand trailed lightly over the front of his shorts. "And I am very,  _very_  embarrassed that I didn't finish what I started."

Suddenly his touch wasn't so light anymore, making John gasp both in surprise. Sherlock made a pleased 'hm' noise in the back of his throat. He shifted his weight, splayed both his hands against John's chest as leverage and for balance as he threw a leg over the doctor, deliberately brushed his body against John's as he positioned himself on his hands and knees over the other man.

_I'm going to wake up now,_  John told himself.  _This is not happening_.

What was not happening was him reading the slow, vicious intent in Sherlock's face, the dangerous flicker just behind his eyes, as he lowered his head to brush his lips against John's...

_This is not happening!_

And it was not happening because John realized that he was awake  _now_ and it was  _real_ , and, acting more out of a deep-rooted sense of self-preservation than anything else, he gave Sherlock a violent shove that sent him over the edge of the bed.

" _No_! Just, God –  _no_!" He sat up, glaring at Sherlock who was still in the process of picking himself up off the floor.

"While I'm  _flattered_  by your  _interest_ , Sherlock," he said, and he realized as he did that he'd been longing to use that line for months and had just been waiting for the right opportunity, "you should know that I – oh, fuck it, I like  _women_ , Sherlock,  _women_! You know – two X chromosomes, no Y, boobs and a vagina!"

John realized belatedly that that did not sound good at all. He was thankful that Sarah wasn't there to hear that. Or Harry for that matter, even if she was into the same thing. Then he remembered that Mrs. Hudson was probably somewhere downstairs, and he hoped to God and all the saints that he hadn't shouted it loud enough for her to hear.

"And if I saved your fucking life, well, maybe I just figured I needed help with the rent." That was low, and nasty but he didn't care much about that. "Consider that maybe I'm still here because I can't afford to be anywhere else! Self-absorbed, presumptuous  _bastard_ , nowhere in the bloody heliocentric scheme of the universe does  _anything_  and _everything_  have to revolve around  _you_." He stabbed a finger in the air towards Sherlock for emphasis. "Things go around the bloody sun, all right, and even then,  _even then_  all it has is helium, and, and  _gravity_ , and nowhere is it assumed that just because the damned planets, the damned bloody  _Earth_  included, stick around does it have the right to go and snog them against the bookshelves!"

"Oh? It does that then, go around the sun?" The question sounded genuine, if very uninterested, and John found it maddening that Sherlock  _would_  go and focus on that one completely irrelevant point.

"Just get out, Sherlock!  _Out_!"

"Right then." Something changed in Sherlock's expression, and it was so subtle that John wondered if he had imagined it. The eager, heated look seemed to bank and dull, and while some semblance of it was left on the surface, something had slid and shifted so that you could see the calculating, measuring mind working underneath. And there was something about the pleased look in Sherlock's eyes which said that the calculating, measuring mind had just gone ' _Aha!'_ "I'll be off out. Don't wait up."

And he left, just dodging the pillow John heaved at him as he went.


	9. Chapter 9

It had been a gentle, almost chaste kiss. It had been awkward too at first, when John Willoughby had yanked too hard on Stephen's jacket and had ended up mashing his lips against the plumber's more than anything else while Stephen Escott windmilled his arms for balance. There had also been something tense and spring-coiled about the way Stephen held himself, and for one wild moment John had been afraid that he would either pull away or shove him off. But he had eventually stopped flailing his arms, relaxing into the kiss, and it had been soft and romantic and sweet.

John found himself smiling when he remembered it (this caused a little awkwardness at work when he ended up smiling at Mr. Milverton while his boss was complaining about the actress with the libel suit). And he smiled at the thought of seeing Stephen again that night (and this resulted in an embarrassing misunderstanding with the lady who came in to clean). If he had been musically inclined, he would have been singing merrily while handling the bills, the wire transfers, the depositing of checks, and the fielding of appointments. He was, simply put, very happy – God was in his heaven, and all was right with John Willoughby's world.

Stephen showed up at eight o'clock sharp, wearing a silk shirt the red of crushed rose petals. The color was wonderfully warm against the black of his jacket and the fine china-pallor of his skin, and he looked  _very_  good in it, thus raising John from being simply happy to positively beatific. This state of being was further enhanced by Stephen planting a quick peck on his cheek by way of greeting.

"Come on," he said, taking John by the hand. "I have tickets for very good seats at a play, and I just might cry if we don't get to use them."

The play turned out to be  _Much Ado About Nothing._ It had curdled John's brain when they had discussed and dissected it at school, so he was surprised to find himself enjoying it, although Stephen's low, constant commentary and the occasional brush of his hand as he pointed things out to his date probably had something to do with that. After that Stephen took him to a remarkable Italian restaurant for dinner (he was friendly with the owner – the man even got them a candle for their table, which John thought was sweet), and after  _that_  they had gone to a bar near John's place for a few drinks. There Stephen proceeded to get tipsy on a stupefyingly small amount of alcohol, though in a good-natured sort of way, so the proprietor gently insisted that they head for home instead of kicking them out (the treatment might have had to do with the ridiculously large tip Stephen had given, but then again he did nothing worse than teeter around and become  _extremely_  talkative).

He insisted on walking John home ("It's only a few street corners, I can wobble a few street corners!"), and John couldn't help but laugh as they went down the sidewalk, hand in hand, with the plumber, the Shakespeare fan plumber, singing a very loud, slightly drunken  _Always Look on the Bright Side of Life._  They managed to get to John's doorstep without mishap, and they stood there facing each other for quite a long time, giggling (yes, that was the word) at Stephen's attempts to sing snatches of  _On the Street Where You Live_. And then Stephen tipped forward, and John caught him by the shoulders, and it could have ended there, with John setting him upright, kissing him good night, and going inside to watch the late evening news. But he decided that that wasn't going to be the end of that.

"Listen," he told Stephen, who had rocked backwards against the iron railing on the steps, "I don't think you should go home alone."

"Oh, you coming with me then?" asked the plumber jovially. "I'd like that. I would. Be hell to explain to the flatmate, but I'd like that."

John found himself blushing, which was silly, it wasn't like he hadn't gone home with other men before. He might have had a bit too much to drink as well. Or it could be that he was just as skittish as a teenager with a crush.

"No," he said, enunciating clearly to prove to himself that he was definitely not drunk, "We're at my flat. It'd be silly to look for your place when we're at my flat. You don't have to stay very long if you don't want to. Just have a cup of coffee, sober up a bit before you go home, okay?"

Stephen nodded slowly, as if trying not to jar his head. "Okay. Sense. That makes it. Coffee makes sense. I probably don't." He laughed. "Probably couldn't find my, my head if it wasn't attached, much less my city in a flat like this."

"At least you know it." John undid the locks, ushered Stephen inside. "It's worse when people drink themselves senseless and refuse to believe the fact of the matter."

"Right."

"But does this always happen to you, Stephen? I counted, that was just one bottle."

"Very  _astute_  of you, just John. No," said Stephen, taking off his coat and collapsing unceremoniously onto John's sofa. "Usually – usually – I don't get drunk. At all. Nope. Don't have the stomach for it. One sided love affair, me and the bottle. Oh yes. But I don't usually get drunk see, seeing as I – don't – drink. Because  _when_  I do, yes, what happens when I do? I get drunk! Logic!" All this was accompanied by an expressive waving and gesturing of arms and hands.

John smiled as he took his own jacket off on the way to the kitchen. He supposed that Stephen being drunk became less endearing with further exposure, but he found what he was seeing rather cute. "How do you want your coffee?"

"Black, two sugars, please. And no wicked cream  _at all_. Cream's evil. So's milk."

"No dairy products from the dark side, got it. You'll have to make do with instant. There's no way I'm letting you loose on the streets of London as you are, you" - _gorgeous_ \- "idiot."  _But you could stay…_

"I think you like me."

"Yes, yes I do, actually." Cup. Coffee. Teaspoon. Sugar, two.  _And I would like you to stay the night._ Hot water, he needed hot water. He should have taken care of that first.

"That man at the bar liked you, you know." Stephen materialized in the doorway of the small kitchen, and his voice was sharper, even if his words were still slightly slurred.

"What man at the bar?" asked John, looking over his shoulder at Stephen, who was moving closer, trailing his elegant fingers – were those really plumber's hands? – over the surface of the table.

"The one who followed us out. Wanted to get you, wanted you to get a cab if I remember right."

John did blush this time, and almost dropped the electric kettle he was trying to fill up. "He wasn't anybody."

That had been the one black point of the entire evening. Stan Wilson was a one-time boyfriend, and he'd been at the bar with a couple of his friends. He hadn't liked the look of Stephen Escott, and had told John as much in the corridor going to the restrooms. When he and Stephen had been ushered out of the bar, he had followed, obviously wanting to speak to John, but John had held on to Stephen's hand and would have none of it. Stan had slunk back into the building, and John had felt a fierce vindictive pleasure at the sight.

"Hm. He does like you, you know. Really does."

"You think so?"

"I _know_  so." Stephen was standing behind John now, and just barely outside polite personal space. He had that look on his face again, that smile of arrogant certainty that he had had on when he first asked John out.

"Goes to show what you know."

"And you like him."

That was preposterous. It really was. If it had been anyone else saying that, John would have gotten very angry. And he refused to spend another minute letting himself be bothered by an old, very dead flame. John put the kettle down with more violence than strictly necessary, and whipped around to face Stephen, leaning against the counter as suggestively as he could manage.

"Jealous?" he asked tauntingly.  _Come on, come and get me…_

Stephen moved in, placing a hand on the counter on either side of John, fencing him in. "I might be."


	10. Chapter 10

John Willoughby clutched desperately at the crushed-rose-petal-red shirt, the material smooth beneath his fingers and warm from Stephen's skin, trying to find the buttons, because as good as it looked on Stephen, he wanted it  _off_. He wanted everything  _off,_  to feel Stephen skin to skin, though maneuvering out of clothing was complicated by Stephen holding him, one arm under his jacket around his waist, the other at the back of his neck, and kissing him harder and deeper than he had ever been kissed in his life. It was rough and wild, almost  _animal_ , and John was barely aware of keeping up – all his universe was Stephen's mouth on his, and his arms, and his warmth, the taste of that pint of bitter with the faint hint of tobacco underneath, and a savage  _heat_  pulsating, beating beneath his skin.

He gasped as his back crashed into the wall next to his refrigerator. He hadn't even noticed that they had been moving, and it really wasn't important now, what mattered was that Stephen had released his hold on him (in a manner of speaking – his hands were digging into John's shoulders, he must have actually  _pushed_ him there) and that meant that John had more space to work with, and he had actually worked several buttons undone and had pushed the shirt off one shoulder, had bent his head to taste the exposed skin, but Stephen grabbed his wrists, pinned them to the wall on either side of John's head, and seized his mouth again, a  _fierce_ move, more of a bite than a kiss, and John, inherent timidity be damned, bit back, his teeth on Stephen's lips, his tongue stabbing into Stephen's mouth, and Stephen's tongue flickering, sliding deftly against his made the heat he beneath his skin concentrate, coil low in his belly, made him weak in the knees, so it was lucky at that point that Stephen pressed against him, otherwise he didn't know how he'd have held himself up. He wanted his hands free, wanted to touch every inch of Stephen Escsott,  _every inch_ , but Stephen had his wrists in a vice grip, and all he could do was arch his body into the other man's, to hell with balance, if they ended up horizontal so much the better, the blood was pounding in his ears, and he wanted more than Stephen's mouth on his, and the thought of that hot mouth and that tongue  _elsewhere_  made his hips buck forward of their own volition.

Stephen tore away from the kiss then, and his grip on John's wrists tightened painfully, keeping him in place when he tried to resume the connection. His eyes – gray? green? blue? – flickered, searching, studying, scrutinizing the other man's face. John couldn't read their expression.

"John," he said between deep, heaving breaths, and his voice, that _voice_  was harsh and low and heavy. "Dear God,  _John_."

He let go of John then, his kiss-bruised lips curving into a bemused smile. He staggered sideways, swayed unsteadily, and before John Willoughby could register what was going on, Stephen Escott collapsed to the floor in a drunken heap.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm a bit of a dunce, and probably should have put this, i.e. the link to the fic on FF.net, here earlier: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6977813/1/The-Seduction-of-John-S-Willoughby 
> 
> (I'm trying to do a little rewriting too, you see, which is part of the reason why the transfer is going slow, and also I'm trying to, haha, finally get the thing finished.)


	11. Chapter 11

_His eyes open one hour after the light in the bedroom is turned off._

_He uncurls._

_Gets to his feet._

Stretches.

_(There is no sofa this time, though he has been moved from the kitchen and a cushion has been provided for his head.)_

_First the lights (easily justifiable)._

_Then the mobile (an unexpected bonus – old boyfriend calling tonight, anticipated; mobile being hurled against wall after call,_ not _anticipated)._

_Mobile largely undamaged despite impact with wall, then with floor._

Messages.  _Mostly work, some family, some his, considerable number from old boyfriend, undeleted._

Phonebook. Calls.  _Again mostly work._

Pictures.  _Dull._

Calendar. _Hm._

_Next, laptop._

_Ridiculously obvious password, even if spelled backwards._

_Files:_

_Pictures (enough of interior of Milverton's house to be useful; those of old boyfriend all in one folder, but_ still there _)._

_Music._

_Porn._

_Work._

_Finances_ (interesting –  _needs more to become useful, but very interesting_ ).

_Email correspondence (less interesting, but corroborate calendar in mobile)_.

_Security codes and PINs in password-protected folder. (s_ tupid,  _but very helpful)._

_Next, keys._

_Impressions of keys._

_Done._

_Coffee, black, with two sugars. (He is_ not _dillydallying. He_ has  _a plan, shut up, coffee helps him think.)_

_And next…_


	12. Chapter 12

John Watson ended up buying flowers for Sarah.

He had gone over the argument (or was it a fight?) with Sherlock in his head, and while he was justified in shouting at and using physical violence against his flatmate (even if the bit about the solar system had been very random – and there was something that was bothering him about Sherlock's response to that that he couldn't put his finger on), he felt a vague sort of guilt over his singular assessment of the virtues of women. It wasn't wrong or particularly offensive (in fact, it was anatomically correct), but it had been crass and made him feel uncomfortable to the depths of his jumper-wearing soul. He felt he ought to apologize to  _someone_ , and Sarah was a woman, and giving her flowers would assuage his feelings of guilt towards womankind  _and_  score points. Good things all around.

They were nice flowers too, daisies in a tastefully arranged bouquet, and he left them on her desk at the surgery for her to find.

The flowers didn't keep him from being bothered by other things. To be honest, he hadn't expected that they would, seeing as 'other things' consisted of his male consulting detective flatmate trying to seduce him, but he had hoped.

It wasn't, John reflected, that he had anything against being gay, or, for that matter, finding out if  _he_  wasgay. In Afghanistan, he had found that at some point, you stopped fighting for Queen and country and the safety of people sitting quietly at home a thousand miles away, and started to fight for the men fighting – and dying – next to you. And it was brotherhood in a very deep, actual life-and-death sense, and for some of the boys, well, that sentiment turned into another kind of feeling entirely. The Greeks had gotten that bit right about warfare. John would be lying to himself if he didn't admit that he'd felt stirrings of the kind himself, only he hadn't ever felt the need to act on them, so he figured that meant he was straight. Or maybe only very mildly bi.

_Anyway,_  whatever he was, he'd like to find it out for himself, thanks, and not have it forced on him by a hormonal Sherlock Holmes.

Who he liked, actually. He was a maddening flatmate, arrogant, bloody-minded, and all kinds of insane, but John Watson liked him. He used to suspect that Sherlock liked him too, as much as he was capable of genuinely liking  _anyone_ , but that was before last night and this morning (which seemed to prove, disturbingly enough, that Sherlock liked him very much indeed, platonic be damned).

John didn't know how to deal with it. It had been easy that morning, when immediate, decisive action had been called for, but how was he supposed to go to the flat now? What was he supposed to do with Sherlock? Thank him for his interest, and point out that while he was not against liking other men, he wasn't quite ready for that kind of thing at this point in his life? Have a blazing row with him? Ignore him? Hope that Sherlock was the kind of drunk who didn't remember anything he did under the influence of alcohol, and pretend that none of it had ever happened? Take a self-defense class and holler 'No means no!' if he tried anything again?

He briefly considered calling Harry again, but he didn't know what he would tell her. And he wasn't in the mood to deal with her gloating – oh, yes, she would  _gloat_  – at the moment.

And maybe all of this would be better if he could figure out  _why_  he had killed a man to save Sherlock, why he ran after him on his cases, why he stayed at 221B despite the violin music at all hours and the bits of dead people and doing practically all the housework and  _everything_. He regretted none of it, and would probably do it all again, but now that Sherlock had brought it up in that light, John couldn't stop himself from wondering.

He supposed that blaming the proper alignment of planets didn't really cut it. (And there it was again, that little, niggling thing at the back of his mind, what  _was_ it about Sherlock and the solar system?)

He also very much doubted that 42 was the answer despite the gravity of the question.

And this was the state of John Watson's mind for the entire day. As a result, he was distracted and a little distant and abstract when dealing with his patients, and when he was alone, he sat with a piteously worried expression on his face, looking for all the world like a lost puppy that had just been kicked.

Sarah noticed this when she came in to say 'thank you' for the flowers. She asked him what the matter was.

John looked at her helplessly. The things that were the matter jostled each other on the tip of his tongue, demanding to be spoken, but he didn't know how to tell her that he didn't want to go home because his flatmate might jump him, or that he had spent the day contemplating his sexuality. All he could say was, "I used to believe in Narnia."

She smiled at him and sat down on one of the chairs in front of his table. "Didn't we all?"

John sighed, looking more like a lost puppy than ever. Sarah reached across the table to squeeze his hand. "Hey. Thanks for the flowers. They're lovely."

"I'm glad you liked them."

"What's the occasion?"

"Oh, nothing specific. Just a spontaneous celebration of your numerous womanly virtues." John made himself smile back at her.

"That's very sweet of you. And I think there's more to your being glum than not finding Narnia in your closet."

"It was the bookshelves, actually." He decided that he might as well come clean about at least part of what was on his mind. "And Sherlock's being impossible to live with. I mean, he is, on a normal basis, but he outdid himself yesterday."

"Oh. What's he done now?"

"I'd really rather not talk about it." John shifted in his seat, and looked Sarah in the eye. "Are you doing anything tonight?"


	13. Chapter 13

John Willoughby opened his eyes and immediately wished that he hadn't. It was nearly proper daylight, and he was awake, which meant he was alive, which meant that last night had been real and he had to deal with it. The date had been wonderful, but – it had to be said – the ending had been a little lackluster. A drunken, unconscious Stephen Escott whom he had to drag to the sitting room (he'd given up on getting the man on the sofa – John Willoughby was not built for putting taller, very unconscious men on sofas) ceased to be endearing. In spite and perhaps especially because of the very heated kissing that had gone on just before he dropped.

And then the phone call. The godawful, unholy phone call from his stupid, vile, unfeeling, thrice-damned ex. John had ended up shouting, and almost in tears, and the one good thing about Stephen passing out was that he hadn't been awake to see that. When it was over, he had thrown the phone against the wall in an uncharacteristic act of rage and violence. He could only hope that he hadn't broken it. He'd be needing his phone today.

He  _really_  didn't want to be awake right now. If it was at all possible, he wanted to hang a sign on his door saying 'I don't feel like being alive right now, I'll deal with it later, leave me alone' and sleep in. He sniffled. The arm around his waist tightened in a way that was clearly meant to be comforting.

John's sleepy mind seized on this and followed it up.

The arm around his waist.

The arm in the red silk sleeve that was attached to the red silk shirt being worn by the man who was breathing softly onto the back of John's neck and holding him as if he was a very large plush toy.

He tried to come all the way awake, blinking rapidly.

"Stephen?"

"Morning." Stephen snuggled closer, and the word tickled John's ear. "I'm sorry about last night. It must have been horrible, if my waking up on your floor fully clothed is any indication. Thanks for the cushion."

John felt himself turn red. "Oh God. Sorry. I couldn't get you up on the sofa." He attempted to make more sense. "You, uh, passed out."  _You passed out after what was possibly the best kiss ever, which should have been a prelude to other, dirtier things, which was, yes, horrible, but you're a sweet man, so I won't say anything more._

Stephen made a frustrated noise. " _No_. How much did I have to drink? No, never mind, don't tell me, I don't think I want to know. But you, are you all right? I found your phone in pieces next to the wall. I hope I didn't have anything to do with that."

John's shoulders tensed, and he squeezed his eyes shut and willed himself not to cry. "That wasn't you."

"Hey.  _Hey_. You're  _not_ all right. What was it?" Stephen propped himself up on one elbow, the better to see John, who had half-turned to face him. "No, never mind, if you don't want to talk about it, never mind. You're sure it wasn't me? Right. Look, I made you breakfast, will that help?"

"You can't have. There's no food in the flat." It was a fact of life that John spent so much more time in Mr. Milverton's house than his own that buying food was a futile exercise in hoping that things would keep in the refrigerator. What he did was buy food to keep in Mr. Milverton's kitchen, and eat it from there.

Stephen looked smug. "I know my city. Come on, you've got work. Spit-spot!"

There  _was_ breakfast. Damned if John understood where Stephen had gone and found everything, but there was breakfast.  _Real_  breakfast too, such as John hadn't had in a long time. He helped himself greedily to the mushrooms while Stephen had an austere cup of tea (with lemon – no dairy at all).

"You're not eating?" he asked.

"Hm? No, I'm okay for a bit." Stephen put down his cup, and looked pointedly at John from across the table. "Making breakfast, then, does that work as an apology?"

John laughed. "Yes. It does. Definitely. Where'd you learn to cook?"

Stephen waved his fascinating fingers in a dismissive gesture. "Here and there." His face took on a closed, distant look, as if he was contemplating something far away, but vitally important. "So it works. Breakfast."

" _Yes_." John, already in a good enough mood to horse around, flicked a mushroom at Stephen. "Highly effective. You can pass out on me after one beer any day. Seriously, you have no idea how rotten the world was when I woke up, and you and your breakfast have made things  _much_ better."

"Good." The faraway expression dissipated into something more fixed in the here and now. "Do you want to talk about it now?"

John stabbed viciously at an innocent piece of bacon. "No."

"Okay. But talk. About anything."

He grinned ruefully at the plumber. "All I know is work."

"Let's talk about work then."

"Are you really a plumber?"

"Of course I am!"

The indignation made John laugh. "All right, all right. And I'm just an overworked personal assistant. I've told you about the interesting stuff already."

"Tell me about the un-interesting stuff."

"You don't want to hear about that."

"I do." Stephen leaned back in his chair, steepling his fingers beneath his chin. "Charles Milverton. I never knew there was so much money in gossip-mongering. Had I known, I might have changed careers."

"Well, Mister Milverton was rich to begin with. It's not like he earned all of it, ha, gossip-mongering. But it does make more money than you'd think."

"Clearly it does."

John shrugged. "Sometimes people pay to have a story run, or to have a story  _not_  run. I mean," he said backpedalling fast, "it's harmless. People pay off the media to suppress news about killings and things, don't they? The worst Mister Milverton can do is say how a dinner party was deadly dull."

"Oh really?"

"Well." John began to look hunted. "There are pictures and things that Mister Milverton buys off the paparazzi sometimes. But it's not like he _advertises,_ he doesn't  _ask_  for money to run or not to run those." This was getting a little uncomfortable for John. If he had ever wondered about the checks and money transfers, he had kept his head down, and had not asked questions. He tried to change the subject. "He's a funny old thing, Mister Milverton. He has likes antiques, has a passion for things from World War I."

"How morbid."

"I know." He grinned sheepishly at Stephen. "See, there's this old safe from the Great War sitting in his office. He keeps his really important files in there, and it won't suit him for them to be anywhere else. It's supposed to have belonged to this famous German spy."

"That doesn't sound very safe to me."

"Safer than you'd think. It's got this tricky double lock – you'd need both a word and a number to open it. And it survived the Blitz in World War II, so I guess that means something."  _And there are alarms and video cameras all over the house, too. It's pretty damn safe, but I probably shouldn't have said that._ John tried to smile his way out of it.

"Hm, a German, you say?" Stephen seemed to have spaced out on the last sentence. "I have an ancestor who was supposed to have  _caught_  a famous German spy before the start of the war. Interesting."

"Oh? Espionage in your blood, eh? That's cool. Like a movie."

"Nothing so spectacular. Spies have progeny too."

"I guess. James Bond must've knocked up at least one of those girls, once you think about it."

"Hm." That came out as a little amused snort. "I guess so. What time do you have to be at work?"

A quick glance at the clock on the wall told John that he had to be at work almost  _now_. " _Christ_! I have to go!" John stood up in a panic, nearly knocking over his plate. Shave. Toothbrush. Change. Pack things away. Call a cab. Oh,  _Christ_ , and clean up too.

"Go on, I'll take care of things here." Stephen practically waved him out of the kitchen like a very handsome mother hen. "And I'll pack up your food too, we can't have you running off half fed."

"You're wonderful, did you know that?"

"I try.  _Go!_ "

And so John was sent rushing around his flat, getting ready for work. He was barely aware of saying yes to Stephen when asked if he could use the shower (and borrow a towel), which led to an awkward moment in the bathroom when Stephen stepped in and started to undress while he was shaving. The plumber genuinely seemed to be unaware of John's presence – he'd efficiently gotten down to his shorts before realizing that someone else was in the room. John wondered if it had anything to do with a hangover, and asked as much when Stephen realized he had company, pausing like a deer in the headlights with a thumb in the waistband of his underpants.

"Hangover? Yes, certainly, is that what you call one of those?" he asked, distractedly. "Bloody things. Awful." And he doffed the shorts anyway before stepping into the shower.

John stood blinking for several full minutes afterwards, listening to the hiss and patter of Stephen Escott taking a warm shower. He was prepared to admit that he'd have leapt in after the man – though the size of the shower would have made this both uncomfortable and impractical – if he hadn't been running late. As things were, he contented himself with asking Stephen if he'd like as aspirin ("What? No! I'm perfectly fine!") and thanking whatever God there was for the view.

Whatever John may or may not have done had he not been dangerously close to tardy (or whatever he was tempted to do regardless), he and Stephen were soon out on the curb waiting for a taxi. In addition to his usual work paraphernalia, John was holding a greasy paper bag of hot breakfast.

"You really didn't have to do that, you know," he told Stephen as he scanned the street for an empty cab.

"I know. Will I be seeing you tonight?"

John bit his lip and shook his head. "Afraid not. Mister Milverton's having a party at the Park Lane Hotel tonight, and I am going to be a glorified lackey during the entire damn thing. Making sure the drinks don't run out and all that." A taxi passed. The light was off, but he waved at it anyway in sheer desperation. "I wish I could get you on the guest list. You might like it – it's going to be pretty stellar."

"Ha! I don't think so. I can just imagine it. 'And what is it you do, Mister Escott?' 'Why, Dame Judi Dench,'" said Stephen with a sweeping bow, "'I am a plumber, my good lady. I am a plumber by virtue of my wrench – I wrench therefore I plumb.'"

"Oh, stop it!" John laughed helplessly as he tried to flag down an occupied taxi in the hopes that it might just be joking. "I'm going to be late!"

"That's probably my fault. I should've just made you a sandwich."

"No, shut up, it was nice. Better than nice. I loved your breakfast." John gave up on taxis for a while and turned to face Stephen. He meant to say 'thank you.' But he thought of how warm, wonderful, well-mannered, and cultured he was; he remembered how last night had been perfect up until Stephen had passed out; how he had more than made up for it that morning. And he remembered Stan Wilson, steady, honest Stan, and how wonderful things had been with him until he had started going on about John's wretched, all-consuming job. He remembered last night's phone call, how Stan had said he was sorry for everything, that he wanted to get back together, and  _Please, John, I love you_. He remembered how angry he had been, how  _sure_  that Stan had just wanted to spoil his night, how he had shouted  _And that's supposed to make everything better, is it!_  before throwing his mobile at the wall, and how he had wondered afterwards if that had been a mistake. And he didn't want to think about that anymore, or that he was spectacularly late, or that he was going to be spending the evening watching other people have a good time. He just didn't want to  _think_. And he looked at Stephen – warm, wonderful, incredible Stephen – and what came out of his mouth was…

"Marry me."

Stephen blinked. "Sorry, what?"

John knew that that wasn't what he was aiming for. He tried again. "Marry me, Stephen."

"You hardly know me!"

"I know."  _Did_  he really mean it? He supposed he did. John barreled on. "I don't even  _feel_  like I've known you all my life, like they do in the movies, but I think I want to spend the rest of my life getting to know you. It doesn't have to be immediately. But marry me. Eventually."

The plumber quirked his head to one side, regarded John with an expression that was surprise well on its way to alarm. "I was not expecting this."

"Neither did I. Was I." John smiled recklessly.  _In for a penny, in for a pound_. "But will you?"

An empty taxi came up the round, and the timing made John certain that the universe must be conspiring against him. He gave it a little wave, a half-hearted wriggle of his fingers, and it pulled up docilely in front of him.

"I have to go. I wish I didn't. And if you won't  _say_  anything," he added as Stephen continued to be dumbly silent, "I'll assume that means 'yes.'" He rose a little on his toes to plant a quick kiss on the corner of Stephen's mouth. If his arms hadn't been full, and if they hadn't been out on the street, he might have done more. "Call me."

John looked out of the cab's window as the car started on its way. Stephen was walking in the opposite direction, hands stuffed in his pockets, and John refused to look beyond the delicious fluttering hum in his head and heart that his rashness had brought on.


	14. Chapter 14

Nothing had happened. A right and spectacular amount of nothing.

John Watson had gone home with Sarah. They'd picked up a pizza on the way to her flat, and they had eaten it, and they had talked, and they had watched a DVD sitting comfortably next to each other on the sofa. And then they had started to kiss, and it had been soft and gentle and nice, and if John had had any thoughts of a rough mouth and a wicked tongue, he had swept them firmly under a rug in his mind, and had pushed a mental anvil over the mental rug to keep them in place, and had also dropped the mental room containing all of these mental things into a mental sea for good measure. He'd thought things were going well. But when he had started to slip a hand under Sarah's blouse, she had gently but firmly moved that hand to a safer location. They had gone on kissing for a little while after that, and when they were done Sarah asked John if he'd like her to break out the lilo for him to sleep on.

And so John returned to 221B Baker Street late the next morning a very frustrated man.

There were signs of Sherlock all over the place (hastily discarded gloves, a newly-opened box of nicotine patches, a lukewarm mug of tea, and that stuff next to the glassware on the kitchen table, was that actual  _breakfast_?), but the man himself was nowhere to be found. It was just as well. John still didn't know what to do with him, and didn't particularly feel like dealing with that now. He sank into one of the armchairs with a sigh.

He understood why Sarah wouldn't want to sleep with him. Their first date would only have been all right in the context of a cheap action flick, and that only if John had somehow contrived to free himself, single-handedly defeat all the bad guys, and dramatically save Sarah from certain death. (Well, he had managed the last bit, but somehow knocking the crossbow contraption sideways while still tied to a chair – with Sherlock being clever and doing the actual fighting in the background – just didn't count.) The second date had been all right, but it had had the first one looming over it. The third one, though, had given him hope that it wasn't all just an act of charity on her part. And there had been a fourth one, and John had thought that was indicative something.

Apparently not.

Of course, thought John dutifully, just because they'd gone out and he bought her dinner didn't mean that Sarah  _had_  to sleep with him. All the same though, he rather felt that he had been led on, and was a little, well,  _miffed_.

And very,  _exceedingly_ frustrated.

As Harry suspected (and John would never, ever admit, at least not to her), it  _had_  been a long time since he had gotten laid, shagged anything or been shagged, or, to be bluntly crude, fucked anything other than his hand with the help of a magazine or very bad thoughts involving various ladies of his acquaintance. (No, he didn't feel the need to apologize to womankind for that, nobody knew about that, it was just in his head, all right, he hadn't shouted it at his flatmate, shut up, and if he kept apologizing for every little thing, he'd run out of money for flowers.) In fact, the last time had been surreptitiously in Afghanistan, and neither he nor the lady involved had enjoyed themselves very much, what with the alarms and sirens suddenly going off before they had accomplished anything significant.

Frustrated probably didn't even begin to cover it anymore. Ha. Look at 'Three Continents' Watson now.

And it did  _not_ , repeat  _not,_  repeat again  _not,_ help that the only positive attention in that direction he had received since had come from Sherlock.

It also didn't help that, contrary to expectations, Sherlock actually seemed to be some good in that department. (You didn't forget a kiss like that. You just didn't. So many nerve endings had been involved, it was probably physically  _impossible_  to forget.) John was attacked by a brief, unbidden, inexorable mental image of Sherlock and an anonymous woman in bed, making the two-backed beast, and immediately felt the need to scrub the inside of his head with bleach. It wasn't just that it was mental porn. It was that it was mental porn involving Sherlock. Which wasn't to say that it was bad mental porn (and, thanks to the incident of the fluttering blue towel, it was probably  _accurate_  mental porn, which actually didn't make it any worse), but it was  _Sherlock_ , and, given the circumstances, John wasn't sure that he was comfortable with his imagining good mental porn with a naked Sherlock in it. Or that said good mental porn was making him uncomfortable in more ways than one.

He remembered that women were not Sherlock's area. The thought made him more uncomfortable than ever, even if it felt all sorts of wrong. _Christ_.

"Fuck it," said John, aloud, to the empty flat. He was going to have to do something about this.

He stood, shucked his jacket, and strode purposefully to the bathroom with the full intention of taking a cold shower. As cold as he could make it without actually soaking in ice cubes.

That, at least, was what he meant to do. Somewhere along the way, baser instinct took over, and John ended up standing in the bathroom with his jeans pooled around his ankles and his shirt half undone, his breathing heavy and his eyes squeezed shut, trying to have himself a good wank. It was a fairly quick business, and he was, oh  _Jesus_ , he was close.

He bit his lip, and he thought of Sarah, of the girl who wasn't Anthea, and – guiltily – of Clara. And of dark, damp curls and a hard, hot mouth…

John was usually quiet when it came to getting himself off, for decency's sake. But he figured that the flat was empty anyway, so what the hell. He opened his mouth for a full-throated groan.

The bathroom door opened.

"Ah, John, there you are. You took your time getting home. How was Sarah?"

" _Shit_!" John swore heavily and loudly as he momentarily dithered between pulling his pants up and covering himself, and ended up awkwardly attempting to do both at once. "Damn it, Sherlock, what the holy hell,  _where_ and  _how_  is it acceptable to walk into an occupied bathroom, you stupid – you bleeding – you great, blinking idiot!"

"The door wasn't locked," said Sherlock evenly.

"And that's just an  _invitation_ , isn't it?" That would have been a snarl if John hadn't been having trouble getting his jeans up beyond his knees.

"I'm sorry to have interrupted you. Do you need a hand there?"

" _No!_ " John had managed to get himself back to decency, zipped up, and whipped around angrily to face his flatmate. Who was, for the second time in three days, wearing only a towel around his waist. John averted his eyes, glaring firmly at a crack on the wall. "Jesus, Sherlock,  _what are you playing at_?"

"I just need a shower." John heard something that could only have been Sherlock slipping the towel off. "I wouldn't have thought that nudity would bother a medical man. Or is it the situation?" Another sound, which might have been Sherlock hanging the towel on the rack.

"Oh, I don't know, Sherlock, I don't know why I should be bothered  _at all_  by you walking in naked while I'm-" John pressed his lips together before going on, he didn't like being vulgar verbally. "While I'm." His voice dropped, as if being quieter would make things better. "While I'm wanking."

"Sarcasm again, John. And an odd sense of propriety."

"Oh, for God's sake!"

"Excuse me." And Sherlock slipped past him to get to the shower. The bathroom's proportions were such that this entailed his brushing against John, who was still  _sensitive_  enough for the most meager hint of friction to be maddening. The anger helped, though. The anger helped  _lots_. Though it did not help with John wanting to punch Sherlock's calm, vaguely amused face in.

"I made breakfast," said Sherlock from behind the shower curtain. "You took longer than I expected moping around on your way home – I'd have thought you'd be grateful for getting the lilo instead of being kicked out – so it's not hot anymore, but it should be all right if you pop it in the microwave. I've taken the eyeballs out. And disinfected it."

"Damn your breakfast!"

On that note, John stormed out, slamming the door behind him.


	15. Chapter 15

_The water is cold, and the cold helps, though he still wishes it was_ that _much closer to freezing point._

 _(He supposes that he should be grateful that John absolutely_ refused _to look down.)_

_(He also supposes that he is grateful for the view, however brief, but this does not help, and he again wishes for lower temperatures.)_

_Evaluate._

Think.

 _Breakfast, apparently, does not_ always  _work._

_(Given the circumstances, not surprising – but he had hoped.)_

_He wonders how to handle this._

_(A rare enough occurrence, but an answer always presents itself sooner rather than later.)_

_He wonders what he_ feels _about this._

_(A much rarer and infinitely more bothersome consideration.)_

_Hormones._

_Chemicals, molecules traveling to the appropriate cellular receptors to elicit the corresponding,_ predictable  _response in the appropriate tissues._

_Nothing more._

Stupid hormones.


	16. Chapter 16

"Sherlock, I have had enough. I like you. You're the most brilliant, most fascinating person I've ever met, and living with you has been amazing even if you never do the housework or clean up after yourself. I hardly limp anymore, and I honestly do not know what I might have ended up doing to myself if I hadn't met you. I'm grateful for everything. Really, I am. But this has got to stop.

"I don't mind your being gay. It's fine. I wouldn't even mind if you brought boyfriends home. I don't even think I  _should_  mind that you seem to be attracted to me. I guess I should be…flattered or something, I thought you were married to your work and I didn't think you'd be unfaithful. But I mind  _very much_  that you ignore that I have told you, in no uncertain terms, that I am  _not_  interested.

"I mind the harassment, and that you don't seem to be inclined to stop, or even act the least bit guilty. I mind that you, with your extraordinary intellect, think that it's all right to force yourself on me. On anyone. That kind of forceful is very much not good. And I won't put up with it, Sherlock. I don't have to. I'm moving out."

It sounded good in John Watson's head. The snatches of it he muttered aloud – he didn't dare try to practice the whole thing walking about on the streets, he was already attracting stares as it was – sounded firm enough. The tricky part, he thought, the  _real_  tricky part would be saying all of it without Sherlock getting a word in edgewise. If Sherlock said anything, and he paid attention to it, he'd end up arguing with him, maybe even shouting, and he wouldn't even be able to leave with his dignity intact.

It had taken him quite a while to come up with that, which is to say most of the time he had spent seething in his upstairs bedroom until he was sure that Sherlock had left (his upstairs bedroom had a view of the front of the house – it was easy enough to periodically glance for a sweeping black coat making its way down the street). And he took a little more time to polish it over a meal that he supposed counted as brunch, even if it was already early afternoon. And he went over it as he walked back to Baker Street.

He was right to be angry. He knew that. It wasn't just the surprise and shame at being caught – literally – with his pants down. He'd been justifiably angry since yesterday morning.

And it wasn't that he'd been caught with his pants down while he'd been thinking of Sherlock, because that was definitely who the last thought had been about, and he'd step out of a window before he admitted it out loud, but there was no way Sherlock could know about that, so that bit was all right.

Ha. No way for Sherlock bloody Holmes to know. Right.

John wanted to die.

Or he wanted to kill Sherlock.

He'd never get away with it.

Or he might, because if Sherlock was dead, Lestrade would have no consulting detective to, well, consult. He'd just have to be very, very clever.

No, that was just stupid. Walking in on someone having a wank was horrible, but it shouldn't be motive for murder. Maybe Sherlock hadn't meant to walk in on him. Maybe he hadn't known what John was doing.

Ha.

John had to stop at an intersection, and bounced on his heels while waiting for the light to turn green. He would have liked it better if he was sure where he stood on all this.

Well, no, he knew where he stood. He was  _furious_  with Sherlock, and moving out was very much an option, because, at this point, he didn't know if he would  _stop_  being furious with Sherlock.

He crossed the street thinking that Sherlock would know  _exactly_  how many times he had bounced.

And that was the problem right there. It wasn't that he was actively attracted to Sherlock. But the thought was always there at the back of his mind:  _What would Sherlock do? What would he think about this? I bet Sherlock could see right through that. I can't understand this blasted thing, what would Sherlock make of it? Does Sherlock even know about this, I should make him watch the DVD. What the hell is this, Sherlock is going to hear about it when he gets home!_

There was a Sherlock-shaped space in his universe now, and that surprised him, as did the realization that he didn't quite know what he'd do if that space stopped being occupied. John recognized that this was probably an unusual sort of attachment, given that he had only known the man for a few months. It had been some years since John had seen  _My Fair Lady_ (Sherlock had apparently watched it the other day though, if the DVD case in the living room was anything to go on), but if Professor Higgins had grown accustomed to Eliza Doolittle's face, he had grown accustomed to Sherlock Holmes and all his strangeness and brilliance. He wondered if his being accustomed to his flatmate ever could, given enough time, turn into something else, although, to continue the parallel to the Audrey Hepburn movie, it would end with Sherlock shouting at John to fetch a mobile instead of his slippers.

No, thought John, as he turned a corner into Baker Street, he knew he wouldn't mind if he found out he was gay (he'd mind having to tell Harry, he'd never hear the end of that), and he actually wouldn't mind finding out he was gay for Sherlock Holmes. Eventually. In the fullness of time. But Sherlock's behavior, as if it was that easy for him, as if all he was after was a quick shag  _now_  and to hell with the other person involved – _that_  put John off.

Given everything, though, he wondered if it would be a stupid, angry,  _impulsive_  mistake to leave. Faced with the reality of it, John suddenly couldn't think of anywhere else he'd rather be, mad Sherlock involved or no.

But.

He had moved in with Sherlock practically on impulse. It was only fitting that he leave the same way.

Nothing for it then.

John took a deep breath and unlocked the door to 221B. He strode purposefully up the stairs and into the sitting room. Sherlock was lounging in the armchair facing the door, looking for all the world that he'd been  _waiting_ for John, with his fingers steepled just so under his chin.

The sight annoyed John, and annoyed was good. Annoyed helped. He would not be swayed.

"Sherlock," he began, "I-"

"John, it will interest you to learn that I am engaged."

"I have had enough, and I will not allow you to distract me, shut up, please, for once -  _what did you say_?"

"You heard me. I'm engaged."

" _You?"_

"To Charles Milverton's personal assistant."

"Charles Milverton's…? Dear God, Sherlock, please tell me this isn't for your case."

"I needed information."

John sagged. "Don't you think that's going a bit too far?"

"I will admit that it was unexpected, but it was a necessary step. Besides, legally, it wouldn't be  _marriage_. I believe the correct term is 'civil partnership.' Not, of course, that I intend to go through with it. What? Don't look at me like that, John, do you  _think_  I'm the marrying type?

"Just like that then? Some poor sod thinks you'll marry – him, right, if it's civil partnership you're talking about, it's a him? – good Lord, and what do you mean to do, disappear on the man?" John looked ceiling-ward but found no answers there. "That is  _cold_ , Sherlock, even for you."

"It never ceases to amaze me how you can show such concern for people you don't even know."

"It's called proper human feeling, Sherlock!"

"He'll be all right. He's still in love with his ex, and his ex is still in love with him – if they're not too stupid, they'll work it out eventually."

"And how are you so sure? No, no, I don't want to hear how you deduced it. I don't even want to hear how it happened." And there it was. It clicked slowly into place in John's head, like portentous gears of clockwork. He stared at Sherlock.  _No._  "It. It wouldn't. I utterly and sincerely hope that it had nothing to do with…with…"

Sherlock inclined his head. "I was out of practice. It's been a while since I've had to" – he made a face – " _romance_  anyone."

"It was practice."

"If you want to put it like that, yes."

"You  _practiced_. On  _me._ "

"Who was I supposed to practice on –  _Anderson_?"

"All that – God, you weren't even drunk, were you? All that was fucking  _practice_?"

"Are you mad because I practiced on you? Or because I practiced on you  _and didn't mean it_?"

"I'm mad because you did it at all. I was going to tell you that I was moving out because you were  _harassing_  me, which I thought was a good enough reason, as much as I like the flat, and now you're telling me that you've had me doubting my bloody sexuality just for one of your damn cases, well, I think that's an even better reason to leave." John took a step backward. He wasn't even going to think about it anymore. He was going to go straight to his room, pack his bags and walk out the door.

"Will it make you feel any better if I tell you that there is no-one on whom I'd rather have practiced?"

John rocked back in mid-stride, because he couldn't help himself. His temper – already alarmingly loose – had taken the reins and run away with the horses and the baggage. He would have hit Sherlock if the man would just give him an excuse – like standing or something. "That's supposed to make me feel better? Because you'd have had a worse time snogging Anderson?"

"John." Sherlock began to take on an uncomfortable, harried look, rather like a toddler who had been caught at something and refused to admit it, or someone who was coming to terms with being force-fed lemon juice. He also began to speak to John's knees. "I told you I considered myself married to my work. I still do. But if there was anyone with whom I would be unfaithful, it would be you."


	17. Chapter 17

"John." Sherlock began to take on an uncomfortable, harried look, rather like a toddler who had been caught at something and refused to admit it, or someone who was coming to terms with being force-fed lemon juice. He also began to speak to John's knees. "I told you I considered myself married to my work. I still do. But if there was anyone with whom I would be unfaithful, it would be you."

There was a long silence that contained any number of possibilities. If you believed in parallel universes that split off whenever things could have gone differently, many of them were born in that moment when John could have stalked off without another word, or Sherlock could have taken it back, or the two of them could have ended up crushed against the bookshelves again, kissing as though things like breathing didn't matter, or, quite simply, the two of them could have spoken at the same time…

"There. I said it. Are you happy now?"

"What, am I supposed to be happy now?"

They glared at each other, John with all the righteous anger of the wronged, and Sherlock indignant, as if it were somehow all John's fault. They continued to glare, as if it was a contest, and John thought that it was just like Sherlock, childish and  _petulant_ , to enter into a game of no-you'll-look-away-first-I'll-be-damned-if-you-don't. Then, several seconds too late, he realized that  _he was playing too_. He found the idea unbearably silly. And then he began to laugh. He couldn't help himself. It started as a choked giggle that he tried very hard to keep down, and eventually erupted into actual laughter that John couldn't have stopped if he'd wanted to. To his everlasting surprise, he found that Sherlock was joining in.

It was ridiculous, and it put John in mind of nothing so much as that first night when they had chased a taxi over what felt like half of London and had ended up laughing in the hall, high on the adrenaline and the burst of endorphins from all the running. It was good laughter, though far be it for John to fathom  _why_  Sherlock was chortling along with him, with his eyes crinkled and his laugh a deep, rumbling roll of merriment.

"I meant that," he told John when they finally stopped, composing himself enough to look and sound serious. He looked relieved though, as if the worst of it was over for him.

"Well, I meant what I said too." John crossed his arms over his chest, remembering that he was supposed to be angry, but somehow failing to call the feeling back. He had to settle for being cross.

"You're not still threatening to move out, are you?"

John had to think about that. "No. I think I can put up with you for a little while longer. But I still think you're a horrible human being. I'll have you know that I'm still mad at you."

"At least that's clear. Good." Sherlock stood, unfolding himself from the depths of the chair. "Come on now, I need you. We're going to Milverton's house."

"Just like that, Sherlock?"

"Is there a problem?" Sherlock's face took on an expression of perfect bafflement.

" _Just like that?"_

"I need a burglar, John."

"You're going to – a bur—what in - do I  _look_  like a burglar to you?" John spread his arms, displaying Exhibit A: John H. Watson, M.D.,  _Not_  a Burglar.

"Well, more like a grocer actually, which is all to the good." Sherlock was already pulling on his coat. "And it's not like I'm going to send you in by yourself – I'll be doing the actual burgling, if that makes you feel any better. I need a look-out man. And I'd like the company."

"I won't do it."

"Please, John."

"No."

"I appeal to the 'proper human feeling' you're so proud of. Lady Brackenwell has two small children. Think of what it'll be like for them if the father reacts badly when the pictures come out."

"I thought you told her to take care of things on her side."

"A woman like that, follow my advice? I highly doubt it. If she did, she left out the worst bits. There isn't a sensible bone in her body. Or if there is, it's a very small one. Probably something vestigial." Sherlock wrinkled his nose in distaste at the sentimental state of the normal human psyche. "And she handles charities that benefit any number of orphans in third world countries. She'll never get another donation if her reputation is so besmirched. Think of the children, John."

"I will not help you break the law, Sherlock."

"Even if it's morally justifiable? It's safe to say that Charles Milverton is one of the most reprehensible men living in London. He coldly, systematically plots blackmail, strikes just when it will be most damaging and he bleeds his victims dry. If you remember all that nastiness with Miles and Dorking last year, that was his fault. True, he's never targeted anyone _innocent_ , he'd never have gotten that far in the business if he had, but he feels no compunction at all when he goes about ruining other people's lives. He doesn't even really need the money. He does it almost solely for the fun of it."

"Why does that sound familiar?"

"I really did mean what I said earlier."

"And I'm supposed to be, what,  _grateful_  enough to help you housebreak?" John leapt onto this next floe in the stream of Sherlock's argument. He refused to be beaten down. Or confused into agreeing to anything.

"I thought you'd be flattered." His flatmate actually contrived to look hurt.

"Into committing burglary? You have to be kidding. And just how do you expect me to believe you, anyway? After that, that  _act_  you've been keeping up all week?"

Sherlock grimaced, as if he was steeling himself to do something he'd much rather  _not_. Before John could attempt to guess what was going on inside his flatmate's head, he had closed the distance between them, planted a hand on either side of John's face, and, holding him in place like that, kissed him, firm and quick, on the mouth.

"There," he said to the doctor who was still blinking in shock. "That was for me. Just for me. No artifice – though I will freely admit I only did it because I'm trying to get you to help me burgle Charles Milverton's house, which isn't to say that that is the  _only_  reason I did it, because I did like doing that, but I have excellent self-control that would have prevented me from doing that in any other circumstance. And I am sorry. I tried to apologize. With breakfast. I wasn't expecting it either." If Sherlock Holmes could be said to babble, he was babbling now. John noticed how he was skirting around saying the word 'kiss' as if it would burn. "There's the whole truth, John, if that's what you wanted."

John took a moment to look at Sherlock, at the painfully earnest expression on his face. It was almost pitiful. He thought he ought to be sympathetic, at least. But he remembered what the past few days had been like, and decided that he was not sympathetic  _at all_. In fact, he was still brilliantly angry, even if he no longer felt the need to storm out of 221B carrying all his earthly possessions. Of his own volition and completely certain that he was in his right mind, he pulled away from Sherlock – he hadn't let go yet – balled his right hand into a fist, and landed a punch on the detective's jaw.

" _That_  was for me," he said. "I can't exactly say I'm thrilled by this."

Sherlock gingerly touched the side of his face. "You could have hit harder."

"I know."

"Are you coming now?"

"You're impossible, Sherlock."

"Well?"

John pressed his lips together in a thin line as he weighed his choices. On the scale of epic internal struggles, this was almost on the level of a Hamlet, or maybe even a Jean Valjean. Or maybe not, because the answer was fairly obvious, it was just admitting it that was the problem.

"Oh, all  _right_."

"Splendid. I'll thank you to take your Browning along. I've taken the liberty of loading it."


	18. Chapter 18

This was going to be one for the blog.

John Watson took a moment to review his life, and decided that , yes, this was one of the strangest things he had ever experienced, even including that night with all the funny lights in Afghanistan. He went over the situation one more time to see if it would get any better.

He was sitting in the back of a taxi with Sherlock Holmes. (Nothing odd there, he'd done that loads of times).

Sherlock Holmes who was – and he had to go through the list again to make sure he was getting things right – male, an erstwhile smoker and drug addict, a confessed sociopath, the only consulting detective in the world, and interested in neither women nor men because he was in an absorbing, complicated, exclusive relationship with his work. (Admittedly highly unusual, but he'd sort of gotten used to most of it.)

Sherlock Holmes who had just, while not under the influence of alcohol or any drugs, come as close to confessing his undying love for John Watson as he was ever likely to get.

Sherlock Holmes who had just given him his second gay kiss of his life, after also having been responsible for the first one, but he meant it this time.

Sherlock Holmes who he was not going to move out on just yet because apparently things like friendship and being able to laugh together counted for more than anger at having been used as a convenient guinea pig for the practice of seduction. (John felt that a serious review of his priorities was due.)

Sherlock Holmes who, even after all of that, he was going to help commit a morally justifiable but still highly illegal burglary, and out of whom he was trying to wrangle more information about said burglary without actually saying anything incriminating that the cabbie might remember later on.

Yes, it merited a 'strange', even for a person whose standards had been raised by having to bypass the jar of slimy, hairy things ( _"Bezoars, aren't they supposed to show you in medical school?" "Yes, but not as things to watch out for while I'm looking for breakfast!"_ ) when he reached for the jam in the morning. John wasn't wondering if it was all a dream, but he was wondering how to extricate himself from this when he finally came to his senses or if, God forbid, they got caught.

Upon further reflection, this was  _not_  going to be one for the blog, unless he made a new one, something anonymous, like  _The Diary of a Middle-Aged Housebreaker_  or  _There and Back Again: An Adventure into Lawlessness in Modern London._

"Er, Sherlock?"

The man ignored him, as he had been ignoring him for the entirety of the taxi ride so far: his attention remained fixed on the apparently riveting view of the London streets as seen through the window of the common cab. John resisted the urge to reach over and poke him.

"Sherlock?"

"Yes, it has to be tonight."

"Sorry, what?"

"It was obvious what you were going to ask. And it has to be tonight because the house will be empty with the occupants conveniently occupied on the other side of town. I have the security codes and duplicates of the keys and I know how to crack a safe, even an  _antique_  safe, so there's no reason to put it off."

John cast a nervous glance at the driver, but he didn't seem to be listening. At least he hoped not. Sherlock, however, didn't seem to be worried.

"And while I could keep up my little ruse," he continued, "it would no longer serve any practical purpose, and if I have to sit through another one of those  _conversations_ , I just might kill something, possibly myself." John could see the face Sherlock made reflected in the glass of the window. "You cannot imagine those  _conversations_. I nearly started smoking again."

"Ah." John thought of pointing out that smoking would have been tantamount to a suicide – a slow, drawn out suicide involving years and a colorful variety of diseases – but decided that he didn't need the inevitable snarky retort. "Is that what you were watching all the movies for, then? The conversations?"

The corner of Sherlock's mouth quirked upwards in a half smile. "At least you're not completely hopeless. I doubt my 'fiancé'" – the inverted question marks were audible - "could have reached that painfully obvious conclusion with a well-drawn map and a stepladder. You have no idea how lucky it is that you have the same name."

"I, uh, think I want to continue having no idea, thanks, if it's all the same to you."

"You're not even a little bit curious?" The tone was taunting-amused-smug all at once.

John pursed his lips. Maybe he was. But it was in the macabre way that people like a delicious scandal ( _No, he_ didn't,  _oh God, that's horrible – what happened next?_ ), and given what Sherlock's "practicing" had seemed to be leading to, he figured that it would be detrimental to his development as a happy, well-adjusted person to find out. For one thing the telling of it might involve imagery that John could only think of as more mental porn with Sherlock in it, or preludes to such. For another – and John was surprised to realize that this bothered him – it would be mental porn with Sherlock in it  _with_   _someone else_. "Nope."

"Hmm." Sherlock turned his full attention back to the window and raised his voice a little to address the cabbie. "Just here, please! We'll walk from here, John. Pay the man, will you?"

John hurried after Sherlock after counting out the fare. They were in an affluent neighborhood where the houses had nice architecture, large gardens and five bedrooms apiece, and there weren't many people out on the sidewalks. He suddenly felt very obvious and exposed.

"We're doing this," he said, as he drew even with his flatmate. "We are actually doing this."

"Yes, we are. I've often wondered what it would be like if I turned my mind to crime, and I had the idea that I'd have made a highly efficient criminal. We'll find out tonight, eh?"

John fell silent at the thought of Sherlock Holmes, consulting criminal. The world would have been a much scarier place. "Thank God you didn't feel the need to experiment."

"Believe me, I've been tempted. Somehow it just didn't seem as sporting. You've seen how Lestrade and his team work. It'd hardly be fair if they found themselves up against someone who was truly brilliant."

"Right. And I hoped that you might have a conscience in there somewhere."

Sherlock didn't toss his head as much as give it a sharp, disdainful, tilt. " _Please._ "

"I'll admit that I'm curious as to how you came up with this."

"Would it surprise you to learn that this was the back-up plan?"

"Oh?"

"Yes. I'd hoped to walk in, take the files, and leave. With the proper embellishments, of course, it wouldn't have been that simple. I came prepared with an alternative, which was just as well because I wasn't expecting the security measures. While doing research on Charles Milverton, I learned that he employed one John Smith Willoughby, and it was pitifully easy to find out all about  _him_." Sherlock snorted. "Facebook. And Twitter. Everything was there, pictures, employment history, sexual orientation, his thoughts about breakfast…I hardly needed to think, he supplied everything for me." He nodded good evening to a passing woman who was walking her dog. John, mindful that you gave people more cause to remember you if you were visibly nervous, made himself do the same.

"I knew I could use him." Sherlock went on after the woman and her (huge, enormous,  _giant_ ) Alsatian were a safe distance away. "But I needed more than a quick look at his keys, and a man like that wouldn't open up to a stranger in spite of posting things online for the entire world to see. The possibility of a romantic attachment, however, I had him there. He'd recently split up with his boyfriend and had been spouting sad, sentimental drivel all over the Internet. It was just possible that he'd be looking for something on the rebound. So I dropped by Milveton's house-"

"Hang on, you just showed up there?"

"Well,  _I_  didn't. Stephen Escott did." He smiled at John. He didn't  _do_  anything, there was just a subtle shift of expression, but quite suddenly it was no longer Sherlock Holmes walking with him. It was someone nicer, more open, more  _ordinary,_ even if there was a dangerous hint of mischief in his eyes. John found the experience a little unnerving.

"I've used him before," said Sherlock, his features snapping back to normal, "although never in this capacity. I knew I'd never pass if I pretended to be a journalist or a photographer, not to Milverton, and collecting for charity would get me nowhere. So I borrowed the tools and truck from a friend of Angelo's who owes me a favor, and Escott became a plumber. You know of my other preparations.

"I first showed up under the pretense of being lost, and blocked up the kitchen sink after making myself memorable enough to be called back to fix it. Then I asked Willoughby out for dinner, and to spare you the details, I spent the night at his place and got what I needed from there."

"You. Spent the night. At his place." John tried not to imagine what might have gone on there. He tried  _very hard_.

"Nothing happened." His voice was even enough, but he spoke just a little too fast, at near-defensive speed. "You should know that that can happen, you spent the night at Sarah's didn't you? I didn't even let things go as far as I planned – I made breakfast instead. And was proposed to for my pains."

"Okay. And, er, it doesn't bother you at all that another person is involved? An actual person, with actual feelings, who will be very hurt by what you've done? It bothers me, and I haven't even done anything."

Sherlock waved a gloved hand impatiently. "He'll be all right, I told you! Or he'll get over it. By now he's probably realized that proposing was a magnificently stupid thing to do, and regretting it because it's actually likely that Escott will be frightened away by what he's done. Which is actually what Escott will do. You can be bothered for the both of us, if you like, because I certainly won't let it bother  _me_." Sherlock stopped in front of a large, tastefully designed house with two trees growing in the small front garden. "I'd appreciate it if you didn't let it trouble you until after we're done here. This is Milverton's place. We'll use the back door."

John followed Sherlock down a path that led to the more extensive private garden at the back of the house. There was another thing bothering him that had nothing to do with the poor bloke's – Willoughby's? – feelings.

"Won't he suspect anything?" he asked as he ducked down beside Sherlock next to an impressive specimen of shrubbery that kept them just out of view from the house. "I mean, he gets a new boyfriend under, let's face it, rather odd circumstances, at his boss's house, and then his boss gets robbed?"

"I told you, he's thick as lard. Here, put this on."

Sherlock handed him something soft, woolly, and black, at least in this light. It took a while for John to recognize what it was.

"A  _balaclava_?"  _Jesus and all the saints!_

"Suit yourself," said Sherlock, pulling another one out of his coat pocket. "But there are security cameras, and if someone from the Yard recognizes you from the footage – Milverton'll be bound to report this – it won't take a genius to realize I was involved. I'll greatly resent it if I go to prison for so petty a charge as housebreaking." He pulled his balaclava over his head, and his blue-grey-green eyes looked at John through the holes, utterly recognizable, at least at this distance. "Though it will be the greatest of ironies if we end up sharing a cell, don't you think?" The knitted material muffled his voice but John could detect a smile in the tone nonetheless.

"Hell's bells." John pulled the thing on. "If I end up sharing a cell with you, I will  _kill_  you, do I make myself clear?"


	19. Chapter 19

Charles Milverton was a small man of fifty, a little on the plump side, who tended to remind people of the Earl of Emsworth from the P.G. Wodehouse stories. He was exactly the right shape for peering benevolently at the world and being endearingly absent-minded.

Neither of which he was in the habit of doing.

John Willoughby whistled through his teeth. He could have done with a bit of benevolent peering. Or a stiff drink. Or for Mr. Milverton miraculously not to notice that they had been supplied with the wrong kind of champagne. John cast a worried eye towards at where his boss was greeting his guests with a warm handshake, a friendly smile, and an appraising gaze that passed instant judgment on their wardrobe and jewelry. He wasn't going to ask that Mr. Milverton not mind about the drinks, because he  _would_ mind, so his best hope was for his boss to remain ignorant. It was all very stressful.

Things were made so much more stressful by the fact that he hadn't heard from Stephen all day. Not a text. John was starting to think that maybe he'd made a mistake in not passing off the entire 'Marry me' thing off as a joke. It wasn't that he regretted asking Stephen Escott to marry him. He rather enjoyed the prospect of marriage (and good sex, though not necessarily – and preferably not – in that order) but it had occurred to him during the course of the day, while herding caterers and making last-minute changes to the guest list, that it might just be possible that Stephen didn't feel the same way.

And silence meaning 'yes?' God, where had he gotten  _that_  juvenile idea? If the proposal itself hadn't scared Stephen away, having been proposed to by a twit with the mentality of a primary school kid might have done the job.

John hadn't called Stephen himself because, well, things had happened. Minor things, yes, but they had kept happening in a continuous, inexorable stream ever since he realized what a fool thing it was that he had gone and done some time after he had polished off the rest of his breakfast. Between one small, immediate emergency and the next he hardly had a quiet moment to himself, and when he did, he took too long deciding whether or not calling would be seen as a clingy or desperate, or if maybe he should text instead, so he ended up not calling or texting at all. (Except for when he phoned the caterer's. And the florist's. And the hotel. And texted the driver. But that was different, that was easy, that was  _business_.)

Things were going well smoothly enough now, though ( _barring the champagne, please, God, let Mr. Milverton not notice the champagne, please let him stick to the sparkling water the entire evening, thank you, Jesus_ ), and John decided that it was now or never. He meant it this time. He would call Stephen because it was perfectly all right to call the person to whom you may or may not be engaged. It was, actually, the decent thing to do, seeing as things weren't entirely clear. And he would…not apologize, apologizing would imply that he was taking it back, he didn't _want_  to take it back, it wasn't as though he didn't want to be engaged to Stephen, but he would apologize for putting the man in a difficult position. Because it was a horribly unfair thing to force on anyone, a marriage proposal, you know, especially if they'd just cooked breakfast with a hangover. He might have been hung over himself, hence the asking. So it would be perfectly all right if Stephen decided that he didn't want to marry him, John Willoughby, not that he, John Willoughby, didn't want to marry him, Stephen Escott, but he didn't  _have to_ , not immediately, he'd live, I mean, he hoped that Stephen wanted to be married to him as well, but no pressure and all that. Um. It was all right. Whatever Stephen wanted. And maybe John could make it up to him with coffee. Or something. Um.

Yes, that sounded pretty clear. Right. Now or never, wasn't it? Right.

John took cover behind a convenient potted palm as the guests sat themselves down for dinner, and thumbed the buttons that would make the call happen. (Why, yes, he did have Stephen's number memorized, and, no, it wasn't strange at all, he memorized phone numbers, truly he did.)

He waited.

Stephen was not picking up. There might have been any number of perfectly good reasons for it, but  _he wasn't picking up._

"Is something the matter, John?"

John Willoughby nearly leapt out o f his skin. "Ah, no, Mister Milverton, not at all," he said hurriedly, spinning around to face his boss, his hands doing a little juggling act as he tried not to drop his phone.

"Good." Mr. Milverton took a sip of his drink, frowned at it as if it wasn't what he had been expecting. John cringed inwardly, even though he knew, he knew, he  _knew_  that it was the right kind of water, because it would have been entirely in keeping with his boss's character to decide that he had wanted something else all along. Mr. Milverton, however, went on to say something that was much more alarming to John's jangled nerves. "I need something from the house. Keep the guests occupied while I go back for it."

" _Sir?_ "

"You heard me, John. I expect to be back in time for my speech."

"But  _how -?_ "

"You'll think of something. What else do I pay you for? Now call the car, or is that beyond you as well?"


	20. Chapter 20

John Watson was starting to believe that they were going to get away with it.

Not that he'd really seriously dwelled upon the idea of their getting caught. That was unhealthy behavior, and if you spent too much time thinking about things like that you were liable to end up face down on the carpet with your head between your hands, shaking like a lump of jelly and wailing that your flatmate made you do it. He had, however, acknowledged the possibility with the proper gravity it was due– just being realistic – but the probability of their having to explain to the police just what they were doing wearing highly suspicious black balaclavas in someone else's house in the dead of night seemed to be dropping fast.

They had let themselves into the house with disgraceful ease – Sherlock hadn't even fumbled with the keys ( _"A small matter of the make of the lock and the scratches on the original ones"_ ). Nor had he met any difficulty disabling the alarm system ( _"Ridiculously easy code to memorize, I don't know why they bothered"_ ). And now John was holding the flashlight for him as the consulting detective worked on taking the safe apart with a set of picks, a hand-held drill, a jemmy, and a stethoscope (John strongly suspected that it was his). It was only a very small matter of time, and once Sherlock was done, all they needed to do was scoop the hard drive out of the safe, walk out of the house, and lock the door behind them.

This burglar business was turning out to be easier than he expected.

"John, hold that still please. Now two inches to the left, and lower the angle, a little more, that's good, thank you" said Sherlock, not looking up from his work. "Thank God you're here. I don't know what I'd have done without you. I might have just ended up biting it."

"You'd have thought of something."

"Oh, yes, but this is more fun."

"Will it take much longer?"

"Patience is a virtue."

"Mhm. And you're such a shining example to us all." John glanced at the window. Milverton's office had a view of the street and the front drive and the headlights of the passing cars could occasionally be seen through the long curtains. This made John uncomfortable, if not precisely nervous. "Why do I get the feeling that virtue doesn't count when you're housebreaking?"

"Nonsense. Look at Angelo: he's never done anything worse than robbery, though he easily could have, and profitably too. Steady with that light, now. Though I am the last person who wants to split hairs about morality. Not now, anyway. It would make a fascinating study if I wasn't trying to break open a safe. This safe in particular." He touched a gloved finger to the radiating discs surrounding the thing's keyhole. "See this? A double combination lock, antique but effective. The outer dial is for letters, the inner is for figures, and you need both a word and a number code to get this thing open. In addition to the key. I've never seen anything like it."

"But you can get it open?"

"Touching faith! I'll manage it. It's not like I haven't had practice."

Sherlock Holmes, safecracker. Oh, dear God. "I thought you hadn't actually done anything criminal."

"It was useful. Now shut up. I'm trying to concentrate." Sherlock put his tools down on the roll of cloth he'd brought them in, and stared at the lock through his balaclava as though he could bore a hole in it that way. "It might be easier," he said, softly, so that John could barely hear him, "to just work out the combination."

He gave the inner dial an experimental twist. "Three turns counterclockwise, then the combination clockwise followed by the turn of a key. The key's easy enough, that's just picks, but the combination, the combination…John!"

John hastily refocused the flashlight. "Sorry, sorry – just – I thought that car was turning into the driveway."

"Well, was it?"

"No, sorry."

"Curb your enthusiasm, then. Now, Milverton's smart, prides himself on it, it won't be anything typical, not his birthday, or his mother's maiden name and his year of birth, or his address and phone number, nothing that easy, not with what he keeps in there, I'm certain he anticipates people trying to break in and steal this stuff, it'll be something complicated, something obscure…"

John looked away from his flatmate, careful to keep the light fixed where Sherlock wanted it. There was another car coming down the road, and he sincerely hoped that it was only slowing down because it was lost in an unfamiliar neighborhood.

"World War I, he's enthusiastic about that,  _obsessed_ , why else would he have  _this_  safe, not to mention the rest of the memorabilia here. So maybe something to do with that…"

"Sherlock?"

"The Great War, the Great War, Archduke Ferdinand assassinated June 1914" – this was accompanied by a furious turning of knobs – "no, not that, something else…"

"That car, Sherlock-"

"July 1914, then, Germany declares war…ah, not that either…"

"There's another car. And it's stopping in front of the house."

"I'm close, the number's 1914 at least, I'm on the right track here…"

"Sherlock, I think that was a car door opening."

"Toss me the flashlight then, and look out of the window to make sure, why else do you think I brought you along?"

John peeked out of the curtains, and everything suddenly went to Hell. "Jesus, that's  _Milverton_."

" _What_? He's not supposed to be here!"

"Well, he is, and he's heading to the front door and I  _hope_  you have a plan."

"Wait, I've almost got it, Britain declares war on Germany, August 1914… _damn_ it!"

"He's coming in, Sherlock."

"August, August, August, no, he wouldn't – oh, the  _vanity_ , the utter  _vanity_ of it –."

"Sherlock!"

" _Augustus,_ one  _nine_  one  _four…_ and the key… _got you_!"

The door of the safe opened with a small click. Yards away down the hall, so did the front door.

"Charles  _Augustus_  Milverton. He couldn't resist it. And he's supposed to be clever." Sherlock pulled the safe all the way open, and swore heavily under his breath at the contents. John could understand why. He could see over his flatmate's shoulder into the safe, and it was a mess of papers, CDs and memory sticks. Presumably what they were looking for was  _somewhere_ in there, but if the sound of approaching footsteps was anything to go by, they didn't have much time to do the looking.

"We'll have to wait for him to leave," said Sherlock, scooping up his safecracking kit and pushing the door to the thing closed. "I don't think he'll be long. That's his own anniversary party he's missing. Wardrobe?"

John rejected that – another decorative antique – as a hiding place out of hand. Even if things hadn't been…awkward? unidentifiably uncomfortable?...between him and his flatmate, he would have had qualms about squeezing into that thing with Sherlock. Besides, it was a foolish thing to shut yourself in a wardrobe – anyone who'd read Narnia knew that – and they wouldn't be able to leave the door ajar without risking discovery. "Curtains," he said.

Sherlock cast an appraising glance at the floor-length draperies. He looked like he was about to disagree, but John seized him by the elbow and steered him to the front-facing window. And just in time too. They had only just darted behind the curtains when, preceded by the scrape of a key in the lock, the door handle turned and Charles Milverton stepped into the room.


	21. Chapter 21

Milverton flicked on the lights.

Through the gap in the curtains, John Watson could see him peering about the room suspiciously, his sharp expression oddly incongruous with features that could easily have belonged to the better class of village clergyman. And he had every right to be suspicious too. Sherlock had had to open the office door with a key from his ring of duplicates and, as far as John knew, neither of them had taken the trouble to lock it again.

After his cursory inspection of the room revealed nothing, Milverton took the time to look behind the small sofa and under his desk. He even – and John could probably be forgiven the quickly-suppressed impulse to tell Sherlock 'I told you so' – threw open the doors of the wardrobe to look inside it before settling down on a red leather armchair with his back to them.

Next to John, Sherlock shifted slightly so that he could see too, his shoulder leaning against his flatmate's, and the side of his face brushing the top of John's balaclava-ed head. By this time, Milverton had produced a newspaper from somewhere and was flicking through the pages with a preoccupied air. Every so often, he would look at his watch or pull out his mobile phone, and it was clear even to John that he was waiting for something and waiting impatiently.

Whatever it was didn't involve the phone calls the man was getting. His mobile rang several times, but he kept opting not to answer, rejecting the calls with an irritated flick of his fingers, and when whoever it was tried the landline, he let the ansaphone take care of it - no messages were left -  before finally taking the phone off the hook and leaving it that way.

This went on for an insufferably long time. John eventually noticed, to his horror, that they had left the safe imperfectly closed. A mere glance in the right direction would tell Milverton that something was afoot. In the event that that  _did_  happen, John decided that he would tell Sherlock to grab the stuff and run, and either pinion Milverton in place or knock him out with the butt of his gun. One or the other. Though the latter choice seemed to be the more practical thing to do, and any feelings of guilt resulting from that could always be assuaged by getting ice from the kitchen for the ensuing lump on the gossip columnist's head.

It was at this point that John Watson realized for certain that he wasn't cut out to be a criminal.

Eventually, Milverton tossed the paper down with a frustrated sigh and walked – or rather, John thought,  _flounced_  – out of the room.

He let out a long breath. "Bother burgling and everything to do with it."

"I think," said Sherlock, "I understand how you feel."

"Let's finish this, then." John made to part the curtains, but Sherlock grabbed his hand before he could manage it.

"He's coming back," he said. "He left the lights on, he's probably just gone to the loo or to get a drink. We just have to be" – and John could hear the abundant frustration in his flatmate's voice – " _patient._ "

"Virtuous, eh?" He meant it as a bad joke, and he smiled ruefully at Sherlock from behind the mask. From the way Sherlock's eyes crinkled, it looked like he appreciated the irony of it all too. John suddenly realized that he hadn't let go of his hand yet, and he wondered whether or not he should shake himself loose. He wondered, actually, if he wanted to. It was strangely…comfortable. He was still wondering about this when Milverton came back, carrying a glass of water and – to Sherlock's dismay if the way his back stiffened against the window glass was anything to go by – smoking a cigarette.

John rearranged his fingers to give Sherlock's hand a squeeze. He was reasonably certain that he meant it to be sympathetic and reassuring more than anything else. At any rate, whatever it was construed to be, Sherlock exhaled quietly and relaxed a little as Milverton resumed his seat. Just to make things clear though, John tightened his grip until he nearly had the small bones in his flatmate's hand grinding against each other.

 _In case you get any ideas, I'm still mad at you_ , he wanted to say. And  _If this goes pear-shaped, I will do everything in my power to get you out, but I will_ kill _you afterwards._

Sherlock wriggled his fingers in protest. At that particular instant, Milverton looked up sharply, the single perfect smoke ring he had just blown drifting lazily away in the air in front of him. For a brief moment of cold, vicious clarity, John thought that the columnist had heard the scritching of Sherlock's glove against the heavy material of the curtains. He almost,  _almost_  rushed out then, to Hell with everything, he  _was_ going to try to get Milverton unconscious, it wasn't as if he had never done violence before, just that it was never, as far as he could tell unprovoked or undeserved, but Milverton wasn't a nice man anyway, think of the kids, Sherlock had said…and it was Sherlock who stopped him by giving his hand – they were still holding hands, sweet Jesus, they were committing robbery and  _holding hands_ , it was like a bad romance novel gone  _worse_ – a small backwards tug and a slight reassuring squeeze of his own.

 _Wait_ , he seemed to be saying.  _I've got this._  Or maybe even  _I've got you_.

It was a good thing that he had. Milverton hadn't noticed them at all. What he was paying attention to was a light tapping on the French window that opened out onto the paved walk on the side of the house that led to the back garden. He sat up, and as the tapping grew more insistent, stood, strode purposefully to that window, flung the curtains on them apart (John was beyond glad that he hadn't chosen to hide behind  _those_ draperies), and scowled at whoever was waiting outside before pulling open the double panels to let them in.


	22. Chapter 22

John Willoughby needed a miracle. He needed a miracle, and he needed it  _now_ , and he was prepared to sell his soul to the first divinity who was willing to grant him one.

So far there were no takers. He wondered if he'd have better luck if he offered, in addition to his soul, shaving his head and becoming the appropriate kind of hermit-monk equivalent.

Mr. Milverton hadn't come back. John had done everything to stall the dinner party that could reasonably be expected of him. He'd had the actual serving of food delayed for a bit, just enough to still stay on the right side of embarrassing, and he was letting the courses go on for as long as possible. And when the time came for dessert and coffee, he'd have to resort to an impromptu trivia game (thirty questions made up when they were serving the dinner rolls, to be read by one of the younger journalists he was friends with, with the prizes hastily furnished from the hotel gift shop), and once that was over, there was only the three-minute video montage on Mr. Milverton's career to fall back on. If he wanted to stop people from leaving after that, he'd have to bar the doors and hold someone hostage with a table knife.

He had no idea what Mr. Milverton was up to. It certainly didn't help that his boss wasn't answering his mobile – something that had John tied up in knots after fifteen calls and two texts – and he kept getting the ansaphone when he tried the landline at the house. And people kept  _asking_ after him. John had started out saying that he'd gone to the restroom, and then, when it became obvious that Mr. Milverton couldn't  _still_ be using the W.C. unless he was in dire need of medical attention, he had to admit that he'd left ('a small personal matter, very urgent, had to be seen to, but he'll be back, nothing to worry about').

It was all a little too much. John supposed that it was lucky he couldn't get Mr. Milverton on the phone because he was  _this_  close to screaming at him exactly how irresponsible it was to miss the party you were throwing to celebrate thirty damn years of your own blasted career, especially,  _especially_  if you'd said you were going to give a speech at the end of dinner. He couldn't get ahold of the driver either.

And Stephen wasn't answering his calls. John Willoughby wanted to die.

Well, not really. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that he wanted to go away and curl up in bed and let someone else handle everything. (Except Stephen. He'd do the handling of Stephen himself, God, yes, just give him half the chance, thank you.)

He finally got the driver on the phone while they were serving the main course.

"Chris! Why the hell haven't you been answering your phone?" he hissed into his mobile. "Where  _are_ you? Do you have Mister Milverton?"

"I was having a smoke," said the driver. "And Mister Milverton's still inside. He said to wait."

"You mean you're still at the  _house_?"

"Yup."

John looked at his watch, and despaired of anything ever going right again in the entirety of space and time. "Look, Chris, you go in there, you tell Mister Milverton that he's got just enough time to get here before people start leaving if you leave right now, bundle him in the car, and come back."

"He said to wait  _outside_."

John hopped in exasperation. "That doesn't matter! He's not answering his mobile or the landline, and he's going to be late, and he's going to blame  _me_!"

"And if I go in there after he told me to wait outside, he'll fire me," said Chris. "Or tell me off. I'm not paid enough to deal with that kind of shit more than once a w—" He broke off. John heard a faint series of popping cracks that he hopedwere merely a product of his imagination or just plain old wonky network service. And he  _really_ hoped that the hair standing on the back of his neck had everything to do with overtaxed nerves and nothing at all to do with a cold visceral recognition – he'd a grandfather who liked to hunt, and who had liked to take him along during the season - of what that sound could be.

"What was that?"

xxx

"Couldn't have come any earlier, could you? You're more than half an hour late," said Milverton, clearly peeved, to the person who stepped into the office. A woman, John Watson thought as she followed Milverton into his line of vision, though it was hard to tell really, with the hood of her thick jacket pulled up well over a peaked cap like that. She even had sunglasses on, ridiculous as it was at that time of night. "I still don't understand why we couldn't have met at the hotel. You really couldn't have made it there, eh?"

The woman shook her head. She was standing a couple of feet away from Milverton's desk, and dead even with the gap between the curtains that he and Sherlock were peeking through. John swallowed uneasily. He didn't even dare move his free hand to pull the draperies closed for fear that the movement might attract her attention. All she had to do was turn her head. It had been easier when it was just Milverton in the room. He'd had a  _plan_  for discovery by Charles A. Milverton, not for discovery by a strange lady and the resulting reaction from  _both_  her and Charles A. Milverton. Not that it had been much of one, as plans went, seeing as getting on with a nice, quiet burglary hadn't been in his plans for the evening in the first place. It was all Sherlock's fault.

Ha. John could see that going down as an excuse at New Scotland Yard. Lestrade would probably just shake his head sadly at him before locking him up. In the same cell as Sherlock. Oh dear God.

"I hope you make this worth my time," Milverton was saying, pushing papers around on his desk. "I'm already much later than I meant to be. Well, what do you have for me? You said you have pictures of the Prime Minister's wife you want to sell. I want to buy them, if they're any good. They had better be – I don't want to have wasted this evening for nothing." He looked at her expectantly, and when she continued to do nothing, treated her to an arch, impatient, "Well?"

The woman pushed off her hood, removed her dark glasses, and Milverton's face rearranged itself into a perfect caricature of surprise.

" _You_?" he said, half rising from his seat at the desk.

"It's good to see you remember me," she said quietly. "Hardly anyone else does."

"I'm surprised you can say that. You were quite the rising star."

Her sneer was clear, even in profile. "And you made short work of me, didn't you? You ruined my life."

"My dear, you have only yourself to blame. You were so very obstinate. I put the price quite comfortably within your reach."

"I begged you not to do it. Right here, in this room, I begged you. Got down on my knees, and  _begged_. And all you did was laugh. You're not laughing now, are you?"

"I'll give you a chance. If you leave now, I won't report this, I won't speak of it. You're only doing yourself more harm. The tabloids didn't need me to point out your little meltdown. You're clearly deranged."

"And what if I am? It's your fault."

"My fault? Look, girl, if you'd made smarter choices, it would never-"

" _Shut up_. You  _ruined_ me. I never got another job. My husband left me, won't let me see my daughter, my mother agrees with him, won't even talk to me. My own mother." She reached into the pocket of her jacket and pulled out a revolver. Her hands were steady as she trained it on Milverton. "Do you know what that's like?"

And she shot him. He staggered backwards, eyes wide in disbelief at the wet redness spreading on the front of his cream-colored dress shirt.

"Like that," she said. "And that. And that. And that. And  _that_."

Each sentence was punctuated by another bullet in Milverton's chest. She watched dispassionately as he slumped to the floor, scrabbling feebly, desperately at his desk, at his chair for purchase as if getting a grip on them would somehow save him. Then she walked up to him, shot him in the face, pocketed her gun, put her glasses back on, and left the same way she had come.


	23. Chapter 23

Sherlock stopped John from bursting out from behind the curtains when the woman pulled out her gun by viciously tightening his grip on John's hand – Jesus, he was  _strong_  for such a skinny man – and giving it a sharp, lateral tug that was a sharp, lateral  _No_ that brooked no argument.

The curtains stirred. John glared at Sherlock – what did he think he was doing, she could hurt someone, maybe Milverton, maybe them, maybe even herself – but he barely had time to be indignant and then shocked and then horrified before it was all over, terminally so in Milverton's case. The woman hadn't paid any attention to them at all. She probably had never even known they were there.

John rushed over to where Milverton was sprawled ungainly on the floor. He didn't look right. Of course he didn't look right, being shot six times at close range would do that to people, but he looked it in such a way that it didn't look as though he could be put right again, and John knew about things like that.

"There was nothing we could have done for him," said Sherlock, seizing a large throw pillow from the sofa and stripping it of its zippered case. "He was dead by the second shot."

John grimaced as he stripped off a glove to check for signs of life anyway. Sherlock was right of course. It was chilling to think, but the murderess must have spent a good deal of time thinking how she could do the most damage with her six bullets. She might even have practiced. "We could at least call 999," he said. "Let someone know."

"Let someone know? Good Samaritan burglars, isn't that nice?"

"We can't just leave him here!" It already piqued John's conscience – as if robbing the man hadn't been enough – that they'd let him be killed in the first place. All right, maybe the man had deserved it, because, well, you had to admit that some people did, but you couldn't watch it happen and not do anything. It was…it was  _wrong_.

"Yes, we can," said Sherlock from where he had knelt down in front of the safe with his newly acquired pillow case. "Someone already knows." And he proceeded to shovel the safe's contents into the thing quite indiscriminately.

"What?"

Sherlock looked pointedly over his shoulder at his flatmate. "Do I really have to point out that he wasn't driving the car?"

The penny dropped as John realized that he had watched Milverton get out of the  _back_  of the vehicle. He wondered how Sherlock could have possibly known – what he possibly could have  _seen_  – but this train of thought was rapidly halted by a loud pounding on the front door.

"Mister Milverton! You okay, Mister Milverton?" There was a crash, as of a door being forced open. John looked at the office door apprehensively as the heavy steps out in the hallway drew nearer.

"French door?" he asked.

"French door," agreed Sherlock. He gave the pillow case a shake to resettle its contents and zipped it shut. "And out the back garden.  _Now._ "

And they ran out the door, down the path at the side of the house, and into the shrubbery. Sherlock went fast despite the bundle he was clutching to his chest, it was those damnably long legs of his, and John lagged behind a little, doing his best to keep up. He was spurred on by the sounds of someone – the driver, presumably – bursting into the room behind them and a voice barking at someone else to call the police, which all too quickly changed into the sounds of someone running after them.

There was a brick wall about six feet high at the end of the garden. Sherlock lobbed the pillow case over the thing, took a running leap, hooked his hands on the top, and swung himself over it easily. John tried to follow suit, but as he was pulling himself up, a bit of the mortar crumbled beneath his hands – it didn't want to take his weight apparently: undernourished consulting detectives, yes but well-fed ex-army doctors, no. He slid down, and tried again at another spot.

"Come on!" hissed Sherlock from the other side.

"I'm trying, I really am, wait, will you!" John threw himself at the wall. Everything held this time. He didn't manage it as gracefully or as quickly as Sherlock ( _bloody flying ballerina_ ), but he was getting there, he'd gotten his elbows up, and all he had to do was swing a leg over, and then the other one…and someone yanked at his ankle, hard. He almost lost his grip, and his chin banged painfully on the bricks.

John swore. He kicked at the man holding him, and squirmed, and went on shouting abuse as his injured shoulder screamed in protest at the strain. It occurred to him that the right and noble thing to do would be to tell Sherlock to forget him and leg it. But he wasn't going to tell Sherlock that because he was bloody well going – to – get – loose.

A luckily-aimed kick caught Milverton's driver on the chin and the man fell backward with a thump. Muttering an apology, John heaved himself up and over the wall. He landed untidily at Sherlock's feet, and his flatmate reached out a hand to steady him.

"You all right?" Sherlock had already taken off the balaclava. His curls were all tumbled and askew, and he was holding that secret-stuffed pillow of his by a corner, dangling it at his side. A slightly alarmed expression contributed to the child-surprised-out-of-bed-with-a-security-pillow look.

"Yeah, well." John yanked off his mask, took a deep breath of air unfiltered by knitted wool. "Good enough."

On the other side of the wall, the driver began to raise a great hue and cry about thieves and murderers. Sherlock hefted the pillow, cradling it in the crook of his arm.

"Up for a run?" he asked.

"When you are."

They took off. It wasn't a very long run, nothing that had John feeling like he could handle a marathon decently (provided that it was held at night, with a criminal to be chased as a sort of incentive). Sherlock hailed the first cab they saw when they emerged from garden they had fallen into, and they threw themselves into the back seat just as the sirens began to sound on Milverton's street.

xxx

When they finally,  _finally_  reached 221B Baker Street, the door to the flat had never been a more welcome sight. The ride back had been quiet and tense, with even Sherlock sitting up a little straighter at every flash of blue or red light they passed. It had to be a miracle, John thought, that not a single policeman had so much as looked into the cab. If one had, he probably would have taken them in for questioning on the basis of John's furtive looks alone.

He stood at the foot of the stairs breathing relief, good humor leaking back into him with the familiar light and the scent of Mrs. Hudon's potpourri . "Just so you know," he said lightly as Sherlock locked the door behind them, "I never want to do anything like that again."

"Oh really?"

"Really."

"Well, if  _I_  do, I'm not taking you along. You'd get us caught."

"What?" That was unfair. That was distinctly unfair. John had spotted Milverton's car, hadn't he? And the curtains had been his idea. And if this was about being caught at the wall, that was just ruddy  _unfair_.

"For a start, you're only wearing one glove."

John made a very small, very soft 'oh' as he realized that in addition to being little scraped from hanging on to the wall and a little bloody from Charles Milverton (most of that mess had been scraped off on the wall), his right hand was also more than a little gloveless. His glove, as far as he knew, was still lying in Milverton's office, next to Milverton's dead body, and while it didn't have 'John H. Watson' written on the inside with a felt-tip pen, well, it might be enough. The people who worked forensics weren't complete idiots, whatever Sherlock thought.

"The security camera will show the police that we didn't kill Milverton, going by the angle of it," said Sherlock as he began to stammer an apology. "And that's all they'll have to go on." He pushed something into John's hands. "I told you I wasn't going to prison for housebreaking."

The glove. Of course it was the glove. He must have picked it up off of the floor. John seemed to remember that he'd gotten out of the house before Sherlock had – he'd been closer to the French doors – and he just might have seen his flatmate stop and stoop to pick something up off of the floor. "You  _idiot_ ," said John feelingly. "You just had to scare me, didn't you?"

"I trust you'll be more careful next time." Sherlock grinned, clearly pleased with himself.

"What makes you so sure there'll be a next time?"

"I thought you were going to stick around."

"Only if you're not going to make a career out of burgling other people. Or, if you do make a habit of it, don't expect me to join in."

"Fair enough. If you're sure about that."

"Of course I'm  _sure_ —"

"But I'm glad you came with me tonight." Sherlock lowered his bundle onto the first step of the stairs. "And I'm glad you decided to stay," he continued carefully. "I was afraid – I didn't think you would."

He stood there, just inside John's personal space, and for a bit it seemed like he might say more. But he didn't. He merely began to look increasingly uncomfortable and off-balance until he moved.

It could have been anything, that tilting forward of his. In other, different universes, it could have turned into Sherlock Holmes picking up the pillow, or going upstairs, or even losing his balance entirely to fall on his face. In this one though, he moved closer, angled his head downward, and touched his lips to John Watson's.

It was like combustion sometimes is, spontaneous and inexplicable. John felt his mouth open against Sherlock's, felt their teeth click together as he – God help him, he wasn't doing anything to stop this, was he – as he tipped into the kiss, because that was what it was, there was no other word for it, it was another bleeding kiss, he was kissing Sherlock Holmes, actively  _kissing Sherlock Holmes_ , and it felt…right, they  _fit_  somehow, even when Sherlock, encouraged, put a hand on the back of his neck and another on his waist, only it wasn't quite all right because John didn't know what to do with his hands, one was holding his glove and the other was a bit of a bloody mess, and he was holding both awkwardly out to the side, and, Jesus, it was Milverton's blood, they'd just seen the man gunned down and now they were snogging, and aside from being gay or more than mildly bisexual (oh dear  _God_ ), that probably meant he was a cold-blooded bastard too, didn't it?

_No_ , John wanted to say.  _Wait_.

If only for him to rearrange his hands and his priorities, and to check his conscience to make sure that he  _wanted_ this, that it wasn't just hormone-driven pouncing-on-the-first-available-moving-thing, that it wasn't something he'd regret in the morning, that it wasn't something _Sherlock_  would regret in the morning, and, well, that they both meant it, basically. He just wanted to be sure.

_Not now._

Only he didn't  _want_  to say it because saying things like that at times like this could close all sorts of doors that you didn't mean to shut, at least not forever, and not so that you needed a crowbar or a tank to get them open again. That was what was wrong with the idea of moving out. He didn't want to end up having a Sherlock-shaped hole in his universe, because Sherlock, as a friend or a…a…whatever, he was – he was worth living for.

Well. That was a revelation.

Even if he was, come to think of it, on some level, still angry at the man. Or he should have been, anyway.

No, no, no, too much, he was thinking too much, he was  _thinking_  too damn much, it was Sherlock whose brain was supposed to be all over the place, not him…

It stopped, eventually. John couldn't have said which of them pulled away first (Sherlock probably knew). He was still holding his arms out stiffly, rather like a penguin. Sherlock had moved back a little, had taken his hand away from John's waist. He was taking deep, measured breaths, and was looking quite surprised, as though he couldn't really believe what he had actually gone and done.

They stayed like that for a while, neither daring to move. John was very much aware of the hand that was still resting lightly on his neck, and the way that his flatmate was studying him, his lips (and it was only now that John saw – no, sorry,  _observed_  – the cupid's bow) pressed together, as he regarded the doctor as carefully and thoroughly as if he had been a particularly useful piece of evidence. The scrutiny was a little unnerving, and John wondered what he could be looking for.

Quite suddenly, Sherlock snatched his hand back, and walked deliberately up the stairs without so much as a backward glance.

There might have been an invitation in there. And John might have said yes if he had been asked. Aloud. In definite terms. But he hadn't been. And he was tired and a little sore in some places, and he'd just committed robbery and witnessed a murder and snogged his flatmate, and he wasn't sure what you did after that. He sank down next to the pillow, scrubbing at his face with his clean hand. Wasn't there a manual for this sort of thing? Like a sort of more graphic etiquette book, maybe?

A door slammed somewhere above him. All right, maybe it hadn't been an invite. Or if it had been, it had come with a definite expiration.

It was quite some time before John followed Sherlock up to the flat. He left the pillowcase on the sofa, for Sherlock to find in the morning, before going even further upstairs to his own room.

 


	24. Chapter 24

"I'm afraid I don't know what you're talking about. At all. " John Willoughby ran an anxious hand through his hair. It was already a mess. And he'd already undone his bowtie, taken off his jacket, and undone the two top buttons of his dress shirt. He'd also already thrown up twice since he'd gotten to Mr. Milverton's house and seen the body; once in the office behind the sofa, which earned him a dirty look from the sour-faced bloke in the blue crime scene coveralls who came in after him, and again in the bathroom when he was trying to clean the sick off the front of his shirt.

It had already occurred to him, as his dinner was forcing its way back up his throat, that maybe jumping in a taxi in a mad rush to Mr. Milverton's house hadn't been one of his more brilliant ideas. He wasn't sure what he'd meant to do, really. But he was so used to jumping up and running when Mr. Milverton needed anything that he jumped up and ran now. And there was nothing he could do for Mr. Milverton this time. Anymore. Ever again. Except perhaps arrange the funeral. Oh God.

The thought left him giddy and light-headed, and the only thing that was perfectly clear right now was that he didn't want to be sick again because he didn't think he had anything left to throw up. And he really couldn't understand what the silver-haired detective inspector was saying to him, so he'd fallen back on the most basic instinct of a man being questioned by the law:  _deny everything_.

"I'm only asking if Mister Milverton was going to meet anyone here tonight." The D.I. had been nice and remarkably patient for a man who'd had someone burst onto his crime scene shouting for Mr. Milverton and then been sick all over the place when Mr. Milverton had, in fact, been found. He'd gotten John off his knees and steered him to the bathroom and then out of the house to sit in the ambulance for a bit.

"I don't know. No. I'm sorry. It was just the party tonight. He even had a speech. Wrote it down and everything. Said he'd be back to say it." John gulped as he felt his stomach heave again. "He just said he needed something from the house, and that he'd – that he'd come back in time." He shuddered under the orange blanket the paramedics had draped around his shoulders. They said he was in shock, and he was inclined to agree with them.

"Just a couple more questions, Mister Willoughby, and then we'll let you go." The man waited for John to nod before going on. "Has Mister Milverton received any threats recently?"

"What?  _What_? No!" John fidgeted uncomfortably. "Nothing serious, nothing out of the ordinary."

"Nothing out of the ordinary?"

"You know, unhappy fans, unhappy personalities, unhappy editors – people unhappy with his blog or his column. Mister Milverton, he doesn't – didn't – mince words. Um. There's an actress suing for libel" –he gave Lestrade her name– "but that's the usual stuff. You know how it is."

"I don't, actually," said Lestrade, taking this down in his notebook. "Were you aware that Charles Milverton was suspected of blackmail?"

"No." It came out as a squeak. John cleared his throat.

"You don't know about anything about that?" The question was more pointed now, with a definite talk-now-or-you'll-be-in-trouble-when-I-find-out edge.

"No!" And it was true, too. He didn't, strictly speaking,  _know_ anything. There were things Mr. Milverton didn't let him in on. Oh, he wasn't stupid, he'd seen papers for a bank account in the Cayman Islands for an Arthur Claudius Miller, he'd heard Mr. Milverton on the phone a couple of times about that, and he had a pretty shrewd suspicion about what he kept in that safe of his, but he didn't  _know_ anything, not for real. If he'd poked around, maybe he'd have found something, but he hadn't wanted to. "I don't. Please, I just want to go home, I'll answer questions tomorrow if you like, there're security cameras, we record the videos, they're there, take them. Please. I. Want. To go. Home." A thought occurred to him. "You're not arresting me, are you?"

"No, I'm not. There's nothing to arrest you for, Mister Willoughby, unless you count contaminating a crime a scene. Which I  _don't_ ," he said pointedly, as John started to go pale. "Just one more thing. How many people have access to the house?"

"Mister Milverton. Me. Chris – that's the driver – doesn't have his own set of keys. The housekeeper doesn't either, I'm usually here when she comes to do for us, and if I'm not, I leave the key for her under a flower pot."

"And there's been nobody else?"

"Um. No?"

"Anybody who's done a bit of recent work on the house, maybe?"

"We had a plumber come to fix the kitchen sink…" John trailed off at the thought of Stephen Escott. Had he really been that worried that he couldn't contact the man? It still bothered him, of course it did, but it seemed so far away now.

"Yes?" prompted Lestrade.

"Nothing," said John. He laughed weakly. "I thought he was fit, that's all."

That was all the D.I. wanted, aside from where they could find the footage from the security cameras. John was told that he was probably going to be asked more questions later on, and he agreed, anything to make them to let him go already. He watched Lestrade go back inside the house. He'd heard them say that they'd found Chris in the back garden with a badly twisted ankle, and he wondered if they were going to talk to him next.

One of the medics asked him if he could manage getting home on his own. John started to say that he could, decided that no, he couldn't, and instead asked if he could sit there while he waited for someone to pick him up, he just had to give them a call, thank you so much.

He turned his phone over in his hands. The first person who came to mind was actually his brother, but he was vacationing in the south of France. What the hell. He figured he might as well give Stephen another try. He called from the mobile's contact list this time, because he might have been dialing from a  _wrong_  memory the entire night (though he was rather certain that he wasn't, but it would explain why his calls weren't being answered). No dice.

He counted to ten then tried again. This time someone picked up.

"Hello, St—Stan, yeah, hi." Stan Wilson. He was the entry in the phone book just before Stephen Escott. Oops. "It's me, John. Of course. Um. No, actually, I'm not doing okay. Mister Milverton – no, Stan, no, don't be like that – he's…he's been killed. Murdered. I'm not hurt, no, but – God, it's terrible. The police are here and everything. Yes, I'm at Mister Milverton's place. Haha, very funny. Um. I hate to ask you, I'm sorry, but could you…could you pick me up? Please? Oh God, thank you, you have no idea – yes, it's still the same place. I'll wait. See you. Thanks."


	25. Chapter 25

The next morning John Watson spent his first few moments of consciousness in the blissful blank stupor of the newly awakened.  His brain was just getting up to speed on the more important things, like what his name was and whether there would be anything for breakfast, when it dawned on him that what had, in fact, woken him up enough to be having those thoughts at all was a heavy pounding coming from downstairs.

It sounded like Sherlock was making furniture.  Or actually – and the realization had John tumbling out of bed in a hurry – it sounded as though he was _taking furniture apart_.

“What are you doing _now_?” he demanded, halfway down the stairs and more than halfway into a jumper.

“Destroying evidence,” came the clipped reply.

“What?”  John padded into the sitting room, pulling the jumper down to its proper length.  Sherlock was standing at the breakfast table, fully dressed, holding a hammer that he was very clearly using on the pillowcase they’d brought back from Milverton’s house.  He brought it down with a loud _thunk_ and the crunch of any number of data chips meeting their doom. 

 “ _Destroying – evidence_ ,” he said, hitting the thing a couple more times for emphasis.  “I’ve already deleted the files.  And formatted the discs.  And after _this”_ – another blow with the hammer – “I’ll soak the remains in bleach.  Or lye.  Incidentally, I’ll be doing the same to the balaclavas and your gloves.”

“That’s not overkill at all, is it?”

“No.”  Sherlock fixed his flatmate with a carefully blank look that even John could tell was contrived.  And that was when John, never at his best in the mornings (unless in the middle of a warzone) and who had just come to terms with the fact that he was Dr. John H. Watson and that there would be breakfast if he made it, felt the events of last night and all their implications deposit themselves whole and entire into his brain. 

_Oh_ , he thought, struggling to keep his face as blank as Sherlock’s .

And _Oh dear._

And _Holyfuckingcrapshitshitshitfuck._

“This must be Friday,” he said for the sake of saying something, _anything,_ into the sudden, decidedly less-than-comfortable silence.  “I could never get the hang of Fridays.”  He shuffled his feet and, surreptitiously he hoped, changed the motion into going to the kitchen.  Which was a perfectly normal, viable thing to do in the morning, nothing evasive about it at all.  “Er, care for coffee?”

“If it’s not too much trouble.”

“When is it ever?”  John wasn’t precisely sure if Sherlock heard that over his renewed attempts to pound the incriminating articles into dust, but that was all to the good.  He didn’t think he was imagining the added viciousness there.  He resolved to stay in the kitchen for a long as he could – until the next Ice Age, maybe.  ( _He could make it, he was in the kitchen, he’d have food._ )

No, that was silly.  He was an adult, and he would handle this like one. 

Maybe after the next Ice Age. 

Though Sherlock was bound to come into the kitchen sometime before then.  Damn.

No, no, _no_.  John passed a hand over his face as he filled the kettle (there wasn’t any more coffee for brewing, but there were a couple of packs of instant stuff that Sherlock must have pinched from some hotel somewhere).  That kind of thinking was helping a grand total of Not At All.

At this point, he decided that the last thing he needed right now was to get hyped up on caffeine.  What he could do with, he decided, was a cup of tea.  A nice, _uncomplicated_ cup of tea.

John hunted around for the tea bags, which wasn’t the adventure that it usually was: tea had been on the list when Sherlock had done the shopping, the motives behind which John did not want to contemplate.

All right, he thought, stolidly steering his mind to _think_ about it instead of skittering madly about the edges of the issue. It wasn’t the kiss that was bothering him – the third one, the one that had felt like electricity until his brain had turned itself back on – or at least not just the kiss.  It wasn’t even the fact that he had kissed Sherlock back.  Kissing, or, for that matter, kissing back didn’t have to mean shit.   (He knew that.  From personal experience, he was ashamed to admit, and from dealing with the aftermath of the various and alarming escapades of Harriet Watson.) 

Yes, even _after_ a confession _and_ being caught wanking to the memory of the first kiss that _really_ hadn’t meant shit before that, though John had to admit that it was rather a stretch when you put it that way.

Hot water sloshed onto the table as John missed the mug he was aiming for. 

For the far too many-eth time in far too few days, John Watson was confused and uncomfortable and uncertain about the world.  It was getting a little tiresome, to be honest.  Things had been easier when he was angry, because angry was simple and straightforward, even if it didn’t sit well with him.  He didn’t know if he regretted the kiss, and it was a terrible thing on anyone to regret a kiss like that, and he didn’t know if he regretted not following Sherlock upstairs, but when it came to that he didn’t know if he would have regretted it if he _had_ followed Sherlock up, and what, just _what,_ was he supposed to do with Sherlock Holmes now, you tell him that?

Even if it had been a woman – an ordinary ( _that was a terrible adjective to use, wasn’t it?_ ) woman, of average intellect, with a normal understanding of social cues – it would still have been difficult.

He would very much like, he thought, to talk things over with someone.  Or to have a good shout at someone, that would work too.   

He wondered what was going through Sherlock’s head. John hoped he was having at least as difficult a time of it as he was.  It certainly sounded like he was taking something out on the memory sticks and things.    

Maybe Sherlock would bring it up. 

Maybe neither of them would bring it up, ever, and they could carry on and pretend nothing had ever happened.               

John dropped two sugars into Sherlock’s mug, and three into his own.  Whatever.  Just…whatever.  When it came to things he was uncertain about, there was always why the Earth went around the sun, and why there was life on Earth anyway, and why bad things happened to good people and not the other way around, so there really wasn’t any harm in adding personal relations with a certain consulting detective to the mix.  Not really.  He’d walk into the sitting room, give Sherlock his coffee, and let whatever would happen, happen.  


	26. Chapter 26

 

 

What happened was that John Watson pottered reluctantly out of the kitchen. He paused in the doorway for just a heartbeat, and lingered for maybe just a little too long when he handed Sherlock his coffee, even after Sherlock had said a pointed 'thank you.' It was stupid, he knew, but he couldn't help it: he was striving too hard for normality, and was much too aware of the fact, so what came out was a stilted, highly affected mockery of the real thing. (Sherlock –  _damn it_  – could probably tell what was going on anyway, he didn't know why he bothered.)

He dallied over his tea, stirring it far more than was strictly necessary. What would he usually be doing at this point in the morning? Frying up bacon and eggs? Reading the paper? (There was no paper yet, bugger and blast.) Typing up a blog entry? ("Dear blog, last night we robbed a man and then we saw him get killed and then I kissed my flatmate and now I'm all flustered and confused, help" – he could see why that wouldn't work today even if that was part of the normal routine.) As it was, he sipped at his tea, made a face (too sweet, he'd made it too sweet), and started looking through the pile of DVDs that was still cluttering up the floor for the sake of doing anything at all. He popped  _Monty Python and the Holy Grail_ into the player – Sherlock didn't mind, or at least he didn't say anything properly committal when John asked if he'd mind – and sat back, not really paying attention to the film, as his flatmate proceeded to attack the balaclavas from last night with a large pair of scissors.

This is all wrong, he thought, watching Sherlock cut at the black wool like it had done him some deep, personal offence.

He didn't want to address the issue, he really didn't. He actually felt that he'd prefer doing something slightly less hazardous – like stepping out of their sitting room window, that wouldn't be fatal – to opening up talks on the subject, but it simply wasn't in him to stand this sham of what passed for normal at 221B. It was, well, it wasn't the right thing to do, this metaphorical sweeping of kisses under the rug (accompanied, in this case it seemed, by a metaphorical shoving of heavy items of furniture over the ensuing lump and a metaphorical innocent whistling). And John Watson, as far as he was able, tried to Do the Right Thing – a trait was hard-wired into him somewhere between the crack marksmanship and the predilection for jumpers.

Trying to pretend that nothing had happened was unfair on him, and it was unfair on Sherlock, and it didn't look like Sherlock was going to do anything but cut balaclavas at him. So it was up to John then.

Also, on an entirely different level altogether, Sherlock's systematic destruction of evidence was starting to drive him up the wall. The man was about to start on his gloves.

John opened his mouth, determined to Do the Right Thing or die trying. "Do you really have to do that?" No, that wasn't it. He tried again. "I like those gloves." Still not what he was aiming for, but at least he seemed to be getting somewhere.

"You'd ruin them anyway, if you tried to get the blood off properly. Get new ones."

"I don't see you wrecking your coat. Or  _your_  gloves."

"I didn't get Milverton's blood on mine." Sherlock punctuated this with an unrepentant  _snicker-snack_  of his scissors. "Would you rather leave evidence lying around?"

"Come off it, Sherlock, what are the chances-"

"Shush." Quite suddenly, he froze, listening, holding up a hand to silence John.

There were steps coming from downstairs that were quickly turning into steps going upstairs. They were, John thought, too heavy and too brisk to be Mrs. Hudson, and whoever it was hadn't bothered to knock or ring the doorbell, which suggested either a shocking brazenness or an appalling familiarity.

"Lestrade," said Sherlock. "He always skips the bottom step."

" _Christ!_ "

Warm tea sloshed onto the table as John dropped his mug to help Sherlock shove the bits of balaclava into the pillowcase. They cleared the table before the D.I. made it to the first landing; John zipped the case shut as he made the right turn to the second half of the staircase; and Sherlock snatched it from his flatmate and tossed it onto John's armchair just in time to turn the motion into snapping around to greet Lestrade with a sharp "What is it?" as the man stepped through the doorway of their sitting room.

"Murder," he said, far too used to Sherlock to be taken aback by the lack of social niceties. He nodded a 'good morning' at John though, and the doctor put on what he hoped was a frank, open grin in response, which was a bit of a job since he was trying to surreptitiously inch his way to the armchair – the blasted pillow had landed on top of the Union Jack cushion and was looking damnably conspicuous where it was. "Have you seen the papers today?"

Sherlock shook his head, and took the newspaper Lestrade held out to him. John could see the story  _GOSSIP MAN MILVERTON SHOT, KILLED IN HOME INVASION_  featured prominently on the front page, accompanied by a photo of the house wreathed in blue-and-white crime scene tape side by side with one of Milverton in an astrakhan coat, alive and looking down his nose at whoever was taking the picture through gold-rimmed spectacles.

"The death of a gossip colmunist?" Sherlock frowned at the periodical, barely glancing at the article before throwing the paper down with a casual flick of his wrist, neatly, John noticed, covering the hammer and scissors he'd been using. "Not interested."

"It's a pretty high profile case. We've had the media swarming all over us since they got found out. They've already gotten to Milverton's PA and his driver."

"You know that doesn't matter to me. It seems straightforward enough given the man's profession. Find out who he's pissed off, they probably did it."

"We're doing that, thanks-"

"Astounding. Good to know the police are doing their job." The consulting detective treated the official one to one of his more condescending smiles. "You can just carry on then."

John gave Lestrade points for not actually rolling his eyes. "It wasn't just murder, Sherlock." And he did roll his eyes at the wide-eyed, ' _no, really now?'_ look Sherlock was giving him. "There was a security camera in the room-"

"What are you doing here, in that case? Surely even Anderson has eyes."

"You can't see who did it. The angle's all wrong. The most you can make out of them is a bit of their arm. What you  _can_  see is the two blokes who came to empty Milverton's safe – hey, are you okay?"

This last was addressed to John, who had fallen heavily onto the chair with the pillow on it. He'd fallen much more heavily than he intended – he'd been aiming for a subtle sort of downward motion but the news that there was a video of their robbery had caught him halfway through it and wrecked the effect. Sherlock had mentioned security cameras last night, he remembered that, but knowledge of the fact and being faced with the reality of it were two very different things.

"Yes, fine," he said, which was true largely because Lestrade seemed not to have noticed the distinctly un-cushionlike sounds he had made on his way down. "My leg. Happens. Sometimes." He endeavored to cultivate a look of concerned interest. "So, um, burglars, you said? Are you sure?"

"They emptied his safe," repeated Lestrade. "Stuffed everything into one of the throw pillows, if you can believe that."

"Unlucky man," quipped Sherlock. John settled more firmly into his chair, determinedly thinking non-pillow thoughts at the D.I.

"You could say that." Lestrade drew a breath before going on. "It was mostly files that they took – papers, memory sticks, that sort of thing. Look, between you and me, Milverton was being watched for blackmail-"

"I know."

"You know?"

"I  _know_. I also know you don't think the robbers had anything to do with the murder, going by the way you've been talking about them – two discreet incidents, and you might even be right, I suppose it can happen, much as I dislike believing in coincidence. The emphasis you've been placing on them, though, that makes them witnesses, or you think they've taken something that could lead you to the killer, highly likely once you factor in what they took and the blackmail allegation, and the desperation wafting off of you says they're your only solid lead. They've either destroyed the files by now, or sold them, and if it's the latter, we'll all hear about it in a few days. Or today, if they're particularly efficient. Utterly simple." Sherlock faced the window, hands in his pockets, and stared stolidly at nothing in particular. "I. Won't. Do it."

"Could you just-?"

"No."

"I've got a still from the camera footage. Will you at least take a look?"

John saw Sherlock's lip curl in a sneer, demonstrating exactly what he thought of that idea, and he found himself agreeing wholeheartedly. Nevertheless his flatmate gave Lestrade a terse "Show me," and extended an expectant hand without even bothering to turn around.

"Thank you," said Lestrade feelingly as he handed over the print-out.

And Sherlock looked at it for all of two seconds before he exploded. "What the Hell is  _this_?"

"Yeah, well, I know it's not exactly  _CSI_. There's only so much you can actually  _do_  with a crappy image."

"That could be anybody!" Sherlock held the photo up to the light, and grimaced, striking a ( _thankfully_ , thought John) grainy figure in the picture with the back of his hand. "Look, that one there, that could even be John!" He thrust the print-out back at Lestrade. "Come back when you've got something better. Or, no, don't bother. My sympathies are entirely with the criminals on this one."

" _Sherlock_."

"No, no, it's no use arguing with me.  _Consulting_ detective, remember? One of the beauties of not being on the police force is that you can't actually  _make_  me take a case. I knew Milverton – knew  _of_  him, I should say – and he was easily one of the most dangerous men in London. He had it coming, and I know you think the same, so you can't make me think otherwise."

Lestrade looked at John, almost imploringly. John, very keenly feeling the sharp bits poking into his back and very much aware of the fact that those sharp bits had come from Milverton's house, gave him a don't-ask-me-I'm-just-the-flatmate shrug.

"Well, it was worth a shot," said Lestrade, taking back the photograph and peering closely at it as he walked to the door. "Come to think of it, that does look like it could be you, John. If I didn't know better…" He turned on his heel and fixed Sherlock with a searching glare. "Tell me you didn't have anything to do with this."

"Whatever gave you that idea?"

And they stood – or, in John's case, sat – there radiating innocence and blamelessness until they heard the front door close behind the D.I.

__


	27. Chapter 27

John Watson breathed a sigh of relief.

"It's not like we could have told him anything anyway," he said, trying to justify their outright lying to the law. (No-one had actually asked him about the cabbie, you see – he'd have had a hard time of it if they'd actually  _asked_  him about the cabbie.) He shifted in his seat, pulled out Milverton's pillowcase from behind him, and threw it to the floor. "I didn't get a good look at her."

"Really? So you didn't recognize her?" Sherlock didn't actually give him a questioning frown – it was the merest wrinkling at the top of his nose and a very slight bringing together of eyebrows – but it was a close thing.

"No. No, I didn't." John racked his brains for a mental image that fit the woman from last night. None did, at least not immediately. "Should I have?"

"I thought you would. You're usually so good with pop culture. I only got it because you've been keeping the telly on so much."

And that, through the vague feeling of surprise at Sherlock admitting to having paid attention to anything on television, was when John got it. Of course you had to factor in the lack of make-up, and the effects of stress and anxiety, and a gauntness that John associated with a general neglect of health (as well as possible substance abuse), and all that half-glimpsed in profile through a gap in the curtains, but that face  _had_ been all over the news a couple of months ago.

"No," he said, in utter disbelief.

" _Yes_ ," said Sherlock.

"But – but the last I heard was that she'd left the country."

"Clearly she's come back. With a vengeance, if you'll pardon the pun. I think the hat was Norwegian, and the sunglasses were cheap, tourist things, both probably bought en route at the last minute. She's cleverer than she looks." Sherlock stepped up to the pillow, and stamped on it. "If she's really smart, she'll be out of the country again by now. If I'm  _right_ ," he continued, grinding his heel into the thing, "she'll be trying to see her daughter first, and that will get her into trouble. Even more trouble if Lestrade's team performs with surprising lucidity, though I doubt they will. Will you be needing the kitchen sink?"

"What? No, do whatever you like with it." It would actually be nice for the sink – for  _something_  – to go back to normal. Well. 221B normal. "Start the circle of life again over there, by all means."

"Excellent. Though there's no need to exaggerate." Sherlock's tone was reproachful, and maybe a little distant now it was just the two of them again without any detective inspectors to throw off the scent. "I'll clear it up again after this has soaked for a few hours." And he snatched up the bundle of evidence and took it to the kitchen.

There was a snapping that could have been Sherlock pulling on a pair of latex gloves, then the gurgling and splashing of a sink being filled, and then the cloying scent of bleach was drifting into the sitting room. Sherlock followed it out of the kitchen and slid the glass doors shut behind him.

"I'll just leave that there for a while. If you could take it out around three o'clock and dump it a couple of streets away, I'd be very much obliged."

"Three?" John was incredulous. "But it's just turned nine."

"We can't be too careful. I might even add a splash of drain cleaner in a bit, what do you think?" Yes, that was definitely distant. He might have been talking to the skull. He didn't seem to be expecting an answer, and he went on as he settled on the sofa. "I'll turn it over at around ten." Sherlock peeled off his left hand glove, tucked it into his right hand, and turned that one inside out. He dropped the ensuing soggy packet quite carelessly on the floor. "Actually, no, take half of it, dump  _that_  a couple of streets away, I'll dump the rest of it a couple of streets away in another direction and take the pillow case, mmm, maybe to the bins behind Angelo's . That should mess things up nicely."

"So we really are getting away with it?"

"You saw Lestrade. Yes, we are."

"And to think I got into all that trouble just for holding somebody else's can of spray paint."

"That's the police for you. Wonderfully efficient when you  _don't_  need them. You already know not to put this on your blog, I won't insult you by asking. " And with that Sherlock began to stare blankly at the television. John had almost forgotten that they still had Monty Python on.

"That's nice of you."

Sherlock's answer was barely even syllabic. John recognized this as one of the signs that his flatmate was getting ready for a good post-case sulk, though it was happening much sooner than usual – Sherlock normally stewed for one or two days first – and he had a pretty shrewd idea as to what was bringing it on. And he was going to do something about it, honestly he was, only Lestrade arriving had thrown him off track, and he had to gain momentum again.

He edged over to the desk to pick up the newspaper Lestrade had left behind, and went through the Milverton story. It was a rather sensationalized account, but then that was what the papers did.

"Says here that Milverton's driver was injured while pursuing two masked suspects."

"Probably just a twisted ankle, unless you kicked him harder than I thought you did."

"No, I don't think I did. Doesn't say how he was injured, though, just that we escaped over the garden wall."

"Ah."

"There's even a statement from Milverton's P.A."

"Hm."

"John…John Willoughby, is that the bloke?"

"Mm."

"We're not going to talk about it, are we?" It just sort of slipped out. John had meant to work his way to it carefully, but, well, he blamed the decidedly studied way Sherlock  _wasn't_  doing anything about it. Not that he, John, actually wanted him to, but there was not wanting to talk about things and there was acting like a spurned twelve year old, and they were  _very_  different.

"About what?"

"About last night, Sherlock!"

"We are talking about last night."

"You know what I mean!"

"I do?"

"The – you – of course y-" John spluttered a bit in the face of his flatmate's attempt at pretending utter cluelessness. It was all in the wide open eyes and the way his hands were folded innocently over his stomach, and the worst thing about it was that he wasn't even trying very hard. John knew that amnesia wasn't really caused by sharp blows to the head, but unless something of that ilk had happened some time during the night, it meant that Sherlock knew that John could see through his act, and he just didn't  _care_. There was nothing for it now. John, still standing, spread his hands on the table, leaned forward, and prepared for battle.

"The kiss, Sherlock," he said sharply. And then he realized that he had a number of those to choose from, and he had to pass a hand over his eyes as he tried to qualify it. The first one, that had been the pretended drunk, what-the- _hell_ -was-that, for-the-case-didn't-mean-anything-sorry-for-the-trouble kiss. The second one had been part of Sherlock trying to prove that he was in earnest,  _and_  to get him to come along to burgle Milverton's house. And the third one. Well. That had actually felt like a series of kisses with indeterminate starts and debatable ends. He swallowed, licked his lips, regretted licking his lips with Sherlock looking at him like that, and finally said, slowly and deliberately, "The last one. We're just going to do that then, not talk about it?"

"Why? I can see you don't want to."

"Well, I  _don't_ -"

"Good. Pass me the nicotine patches, will you?"


	28. Chapter 28

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And after forever, here it finally is. I still can't quite believe that people have taken the trouble to read this, and that you like it enough to read it through surprises me even more. I'm not good at thank-you's or conversation, for which I am very embarrassed, but let me tell you how much this means to me: I started this fic in a very bleak, very bad time in my life, and hashing out a thousand or so words a day became a sort of survival tactic, and seeing all the nice things you had to say about it really made my life. Things have gotten much better since then (which is sort of why the writing's slower), and you helped me get there. To take it from the show's canon, I was so alone then, and I owe you all so much. Thank you.

The box of nicotine patches was on the table. John picked it up, took one look at Sherlock who was holding out one hand like he'd done for Lestrade's printout, hefted the box thoughtfully, and threw it at his flatmate. Sherlock sat up amidst a flurry of packets, swatting the things away like so much drugged confetti.

"What the hell was that for?" he demanded.

"You're being an idiot."

"And Lestrade says  _I'm_  childish. All right." Sherlock leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and fixed John with a look that ought to have gone straight through him and bored a hole in the opposite wall into the rooms above Speedy's. "If that's what you want. Go ahead.  _Talk_."

"You're not going to make this easy are you?"

The stony expression on Sherlock's face said 'no.'

"Fine. Just – fine." John looked around the flat, saw nothing of great and immediate importance that could possibly postpone things, grit his teeth, and got on with it. "The kiss," he said. "That last one. Well." He took a breath, drummed his fingers on the table as he tried to figure out how to go on from there. "It was a good kiss," he admitted, not quite looking at Sherlock.

"Of course it was."

"Can you not do that?" It was probably too much to ask. Sherlock wouldn't know modesty if it snogged him (but then the way Sherlock kissed would likely leave modesty dazed and confused and quite ready to abandon its principles). "Look, this isn't exactly comfortable for me."

"And how do you think  _I_  feel about it?" snarled his flatmate. "I don't – it's not comfortable for me either," he added rather lamely. He looked down at his knees and seemed to draw inspiration from the fabric of his trousers. "If you think I should be skipping along and strewing daisies in the park-"

"No, I don't think so. That would take an extra special vanishing serial killer with no fingerprints, no apparent motives and wings on."

The corner of Sherlock's mouth quirked upward as if he couldn't help the suggestion of a smile. It was just there for an instant – John barely caught it – before he schooled his features back to a studied blank.

"I did think that you'd like to clear things up though," said John. "It's not like -"

"Not like me? Of course it's not like me." Sherlock tossed his head sharply. "It's exactly not like me, and that's  _exactly_ why I don't like it." He spat out the words as though they tasted like last month's milk. "Anyway, it's not important. A good kiss, but it makes you feel uncomfortable? We don't have to talk. I don't need to be told what that means." He swung his legs up onto the sofa and threw himself down on his side with his back to John. "I need sleep. Wake me when it's time to get rid of Milverton's stuff."

He probably  _was_  tired. John had lived with the man long enough to know that towards the end of a case, Sherlock Holmes was held together by a combination of caffeine, stubbornness, and the sheer momentum of his own deductions. Whether he'd gotten any real sleep last night was a secret between him and God and the bedclothes, and John was pretty sure he hadn't done more than catnap since the start of this business with Milverton and what's-his-name. Willoughby. (Poor sods, both of them.)

"You're an idiot." It had to be said. John meant it in a more general sense this time, a sort of marveling that anybody could constantly function like that without breaking down.

"I'm inclined to disagree, and you're being redundant. You made your point with the nicotine patches." Sherlock fished out one that had gotten lodged in the cushions. He unstuck it and pressed it onto his forearm with a noisy sigh.

"Yeah, but I thought the message didn't get through."

"Gnh." Sherlock was on his back now, eyes closed and chin tilted slightly upwards. It was then that John noticed that he hadn't any shoes on: his toes burrowed into the upholstery of the sofa's arm as the nicotine began to seep into his system.

"The thing is, Sherlock," John went on, determined to go on with it, "I don't actually think of myself as gay."

"I don't either."

"What?" That was news to John and he raised his eyebrows at Sherlock. It was a gesture that the detective carried out with greater aplomb, actually, but that didn't mean John couldn't have it in his arsenal too.

"I told you, I don't like thinking about it. One way or the other." Sherlock waved a hand vaguely at the ceiling. "Though if you must know, so far I _have_  preferred men. But it's possible that that's because I haven't met  _the_  woman yet. I don't have the data."

"Oh. Kay."

"It was  _you_  who wanted to talk," muttered Sherlock darkly.

"Well, yeah. Didn't think we'd go there though."

"You brought it up."

"But you started it," said John, reasonably enough though he suspected he ran the risk of sounding like a four-year-old. He sat at the desk, facing his flatmate with his elbows on the table.

And just when he thought they might be starting to get somewhere, Sherlock pressed the heels of his palms against his eyes and emitted a noise like an angry tea kettle being run over by a rusty steam engine. (Well, it was probably several octaves lower than a sound an actual tea kettle would make in that situation, but it  _was_  the same sort of sound.) At the end of it, he exploded into sudden speech.

"All right, all right, it's my fault! Is that what you wanted to hear?" He shot John a fierce look. "Yes, I started it. And, yes, I'll admit that maybe I didn't know what I was getting into. And apparently my self-control isn't as good as I thought it was, because I didn't mean for that last kiss to happen, it  _shouldn't_  have happened, so that was my fault too." Sherlock was at the point where he was using his entire body to conduct the conversation, adding punctuation and emphasis with jabs of his finger, sweeping motions of his expressive hands, and the set of his stubborn mouth. He even brought his legs into it, swinging his feet to the floor with an unnecessary kick as he sat up again. For someone who supposedly eschewed feelings, John thought he certainly put a lot into expressing himself when he was incensed.

"I meant what I said before we left for Milverton's house," he went on, ignoring John's attempt to get a word in edgewise or sideways or any way at all, "but I was just saying it, just  _explaining –_ I wasn't  _asking_  for anything. So let me save you from going through all the motions of putting me down gently, since you seem to be having such a difficult time with it. You don't have to. Say you're not interested if you really feel you have to, but hurry up and have done with it!" And he threw himself back against the sofa with a heavy thud that the neighbors must have felt through the wall, crossing his arms in front of his chest, and glowering at the empty space a couple of feet away from John's head.

"Sherlock-"

"I'm sorry you've had a difficult week." The tone didn't  _quite_ imply that Sherlock meant the exact opposite thing, but it was said pretty damn grudgingly all the same. John Watson pinched the bridge of his nose and, as he had done so often since coming to live at 221B, he prayed to any god who might be listening for preternatural amounts of patience. (It seemed to work. He hadn't strangled Sherlock yet, and that was something.)

"No, Sherlock, listen to me.  _Listen_." The detective turned his head a fraction of an inch to glower directly at him. "If you were expecting more last night, I'm sorry. But I'm not saying no." John looked Sherlock in the eye. It was an intimidating business, even at the best of times, and more so now that Sherlock was actually putting effort into making his eyes drill into him like gimlets with sharpened edges. In the face of it, John sat a little straighter, squared his shoulders. "I'm saying not yet."

That took Sherlock by surprise. John could see it in the way his posture relaxed, how his expression became disarmed, which is to say it became rather less like a targeted weapon than it had been previously. He would have been proud of having pulled one over the man if he hadn't been quite taken by surprise himself. "Mind you," he said, "I'm not promising that it'll be a definite 'yes' in the future – not that you'll mind since you weren't  _asking_  anything" – John knew it wasn't good of him, but he couldn't resist the gibe – "but I think I could get used to the idea. Of you." He shrugged. "Maybe us."

"You mean that." It wasn't a question. It was Sherlock Holmes, of course it wasn't a question. But he did sound like he couldn't quite believe his ears.

"Yeah, I guess I do. I don't think I'd even consider it if it was anybody else. Just give me time, okay?" There were still things that John needed to sort out. Like his own mind, for instance, and how things were going (or not going) with Sarah and how to tell her that she was very nice but they didn't seem to fit at all and it wasn't just that he'd discovered he was gay (or bi) for his flatamte. And how on earth he was going to break it to his sister (he wouldn't enjoy that; Harry would). Strangely enough, what the rest of the world would think figured very little in what was worrying him. "And, please, don't try any of that seduction business again just yet. You – you're good at it, I'll give you that, but I'd rather not be dragged into it kicking and screaming."

"Mmm." It was an absentminded sound that had its origins in the back of Sherlock's throat, the sort of sound made because something needed to be said while his brain was busy with other far more important things. In this case, those other things seemed to involve studying one Doctor John H. Watson with measured intensity. John sat still under that scrutiny, trying to look straight back at his flatmate, and trying, more or less successfully, not to fidget. He doubted he'd ever really understand what went on inside that head of his, but that didn't really bother him. Fully and truly understanding how Sherlock's mind worked would probably involve a human/Holmes metacrisis that would drive him mad and fry his nervous system. Then Sherlock's gaze abruptly slipped from him to the television. "A bunch of grown men in armor attacking a rabbit. A  _rabbit_ , John. Is that meant to be funny?"

And that there was the Sherlock equivalent of a white flag. Not that John minded. There were other, vastly more terrible ways this could have ended. This was actually comfortable. He turned in his chair to look at the television. "You  _have_  noticed that the rabbit's winning?"

"But that's a hand puppet now!"

"And that's just Monty Python. Wait till you start watching actual telly."

"It gets worse?"

"Much worse."

"Good God." Sherlock drew his knees to his chin and stared at the screen in apparent fascination, his plans of a nap abandoned. John grinned at him and took a brief look at the Legendary Black Beast of Aaaaarrrrrrggghhh before rifling through the paper Lestrade had left behind, looking for the continuation of the Milverton story. The arrangement of articles in a newspaper had been explained to him once, but he could never like the fiddly way they disappeared on one page and had to be hunted through the rest of the publication.

"You don't have to be dragged kicking and screaming, you know," said Sherlock after several minutes of silence that were blessedly un-awkward.

"Hm?" John had been distracted by an advertisement for highly improbable weight loss pills.

"I won't act on it yet, since you asked," said his flatmate in the tone of one clearly granting a great concession, "but would you consent to, say, being led gently by the hand?"

John looked up from the paper warily as he realized what Sherlock was driving at. "What, you think you could make me change my mind?"

"I know I can."

"Right." John picked up the newspaper, and hid behind it more than anything else. He had remembered waking up in a bed half-full of Sherlock, and he was sure his ears were turning red. "Sure. Just so you know, I'm going to start sleeping with my door locked."

The corners of Sherlock's mouth twitched upwards in a smile that had very little to do with Monty Python _._

"John?"

"Yes, Sherlock?" he said, staring fixedly at the print on the page.

"I can pick locks."

**Author's Note:**

>  **Completely Unnecessary Notes on the Text** : And if I could, I'd have _Always Look on the Bright Side of Life_ playing in the background for this. With bagpipes. 
> 
> Just a few more things, I won't keep you long. So this is a retelling, yes, because I absolutely love the story and I couldn't get rid of the idea that I'd very much like to see it adapted to the modern Sherlock, and I wanted to read it, but didn't know where I could get it or someone to write it for me (I hadn't discovered the kink meme yet) and it wouldn't leave me alone, so I went and wrote it. (And took a long time about it too, sorry!) I'd just like to explain that in ACD canon, Charles Augustus Milverton has an unnamed secretary "who is devoted to his interests, and never budges from the study all day." That's where John Willoughby's from, though I took the name from Willoughby Smith, secretary who was murdered in The Adventure of the Golden Pince-Nez. Mary Fraser from The Adventure of the Abbey Grange takes the place of Lady Eva Blackwell as Milverton's victim. 
> 
> _Edit_ : And the double-combination safe! That's from _His Last Bow_ which is probably my favorite Holmes story ever. While slightly altered, the code that opens the safe is also from that story. 
> 
> Er, I also took quite a lot of lines, mostly dialogue, out of various other stories in the canon – more than I can remember, to be absolutely honest, only I have a lot of bus tickets and things stuck in my Sherlock Holmes books in places where I found things I wanted to use – and I suppose you will have noticed that I've been rather heavy-handed with references to other things as well. So I suppose I owe apologies to Terry Pratchett, Douglas Adams, C.S. Lewis, _Doctor Who_ , _My Fair Lady_ , and Monty Python for dragging them into this. And also Tolkien. If you got all the references to The Hobbit, I will love you forever.


End file.
